I forgive you.

 

I forgive you little one.

 

I forgive you for thinking mistakenly

You were the only one you could trust,

The only one who would stay long enough to help.

 

I forgive you for giving up entirely;

For lying in bed wastefully for days,

When you had classes and people that needed you

 

I forgive you for lying unabashedly

To the people who loved you,

So you didn't have to see their faces when they saw your fall

 

I forgive you for blaming them unthinkingly

For things they hadn't done;

For things they would never have dreamed of doing.

 

I forgive you for holding the world away instinctively;

Not trusting them to hold you close,

To hold you the way you needed without crushing you.

 

I forgive you for thinking the world was rushing angrily.

You were too young to understand the adult world,

No matter how soon you realized you were too old for children’s fairytales.

 

I forgive you for outgrowing fairytales callously;

For not realizing that sometimes it would be only fantasy

That kept you sane when your reality finally broke through.

 

I forgive you for running every time you felt badly,

For not knowing that every step would make double the work

When I fixed all your problems tomorrow.

 

I forgive you for not being perfect when you were broken,

For not being strong when you were weak,

For not being right when you didn't even know you were wrong

And for not winning the races you didn't know you ran.

I forgive you for making mistakes.

 

Little girl,

I forgive you for being me.

Author's Note

One of those days. Honestly, good thoughts to all the Parents out there. You do what you do and you ask for nothing. We owe you more than we realise. <3 I in particualar, am blessed with the best Mum in the world!!!

Reviews

[Storm K.]

this is beautiful. I'm usually not a fan of repetition in poems, but your revival of the line "I forgive you" in this case really gives strength to the poem. Lovely description and the words flow brilliantly. There is so much here that I could talk about; this really catches the emotion of the narrator, and I think as a reader we can really see that and understand it. You talk about a lot of things that people feel but with such intricacy that I literally am just marvelling at it. Wonderful :)

[Craig2591]

My father died in 1977. I have never been to his grave. Lately, I've been thinking about going. There comes a time when you just have to let things go. It's hard though.

Thank you for this poem.

[C.A. Lucas]

wow! that really gave me something to think about. you pulled an m night shyamalan, and that really made this poem worth my time. it reminds me of something i would write, just not such a surprising twist at the end :)

[Neva Flores Smith - Cha..]

Forgiveness.........I was talking to my father this morning about how I have forgiven someone for the pain they caused me but that they could not seem to forgive themselves and the pain remained in their life. An amazing poem, we have to not only forgive others, we have to forgive ourselves. xoxoxo

[Kaya]

I think, as hard as it can be to deal with people in our lives, forgiving yourself is always the hardest thing to do.

[Coyote Poetry]

Hard to be a parent. Also hard to be a child growing up. I like the flow of thoughts and the use of forgiveness. Real love is permanent and we need to be thankful for the people who loved and took care of us. I like your message in the outstanding poem.
Coyote

[Kaya]

Thank you so much, It means a lot.

[Stanley Wilson]

deep poem lovely read

[Odayin]

This is really nice. It has so much forgiveness!
The last line just made it all perfectly beautiful, we all make mistakes at one point, and we all grow up afterward. Time still ticks. But we can sometimes learn from those mistakes, become smarter and less vulnerable, and then we seem to look back and go "why did i do that" or "what was I thinking".
Of course it's different for everyone and it can be insanely more deep as well, but I appreciate you taking me on a ride through my past, as know you will do for many others after me.
And inlove the authors note, I totally agree!