My Dearest Daughter

 

Melanie, dear Melanie, I know that you know my thoughts

are always about you, my concerns are always for you,

my heartache weeps for you, this you know

for there are numerous pages in your possession

that make it clear, unfortunately though

there are none that express the opposing view,

the view where joy, pleasure, the peace

you bring into the life of this single parent.

As I read over a note I wrote to you a couple of weeks ago,

 “ Melanie, I pray that things will come back to that space,

a place we go and get us back to a life of some normalcy,

or at least as normal as possible for you and I,

where you might give over your anger, your hostility,

your pain, your frustrations, your external as well as internal

self-destructive behaviour to a more peaceful, beautiful young woman

– my lovely Daughter -  I only see in glimpses, as fleeting shadows,

of you caressing the corners of my eyes as you slip by

– like a summer breeze on it’s way to rustle the leaves on my tree –

on your way to your room, where you hide from me

or from your room, in stealth mode, to wherever it is you go

- this Daughter I love, no matter where her emotions might lie,

no matter how many she beats me with them

or the methods she uses to beat me with them –.

Please be back soon !!!, please do not be angry with me ???

              Love

                               Dad . ”

 

I realize, Melanie, that every time I write something to you,

It is always about some negative experience we have encountered,

or you have encountered that has a negatively affected me

and that I have responded to in words – words written –

for seldom do my words penetrate the walls you have erected,

seldom do they have opportunity to form in my mouth, to move my lips,

for your ears, like you, are so very, very far away.

I do not understand, why Melanie ?, maybe it is your age ?,

maybe it is mine ?, - I should be your grandfather –

maybe it is because of you experiences ?, or maybe ?,

it is the experiences I have created for you these past ten years.

I just do not know Melanie, I can not say, I do not have the answers.

 

Anywhichway Melanie, I just want you to know how much I love you,

- more than all the space that fills the heavens themselves –

how much you mean to me

- more than all the heavenly bodies that inhabit all the universes,

all the galaxies, all the dimensions, all the planes our minds our eyes

will be able to see, to perceive -

and how much of a delight you are,

- like the sun at dawn, in the twilight hour, at high noon,

like all the suns in all the heavens

could possibly radiate down upon this old soul.

I truly enjoy you as a woman, the person I am watching blossoming,

brightening up the time we spent at that house warming party

and again at Linda’s fiftieth birthday party in Maple Ridge,

the days we spent on the road, to Vernon, the stay, and back.

You were a delight Melanie, everyone could see and feel that,

as you wandered through those great times with all of us.

You are a humorous and beautiful young woman Melanie,

and it is not just words from a prejudiced old father.

                                Love

                                                 Dad .