Told in the second person, "His Room" puts the reader in the place of someone who loves a person in pain and only slowly understands how deep it goes. At first there are sounds of begging and pleading behind a closed door. When the door is finally opened, the young man smiles and says he's fine, and that small lie is enough to send the worry back into hiding.
The poem builds quietly toward its ending. He is out every night, trying to dull his pain "by anything he could do," and the silence one evening feels like more of the same. Then the discovery arrives in plain, stark details: a video camera, tissues, a body on the bed, "the truth covering his wrists." The poem suggests he took his own life. The mood moves from unease to dread to grief and guilt. The final line, "He was never really fine," lands heavily, showing how easily a smile can fool us and how much the "you" will now carry.