Dearest Friend Poem by James McLain

There is so much I have come to understand in these years, but perhaps more that I have learned to simply be for you to hold.
As I am your friend if I may be so bold.

I have learned to love, not hate, though the journey back to here has been long and winding.

My daughter of only 21 and views this world with a heart untouched by the usual southern customs, she has become my teacher of patience, of grace, of wonder that lies beyond the surface of your modern things.

Her way of seeing opens up worlds that I have missed,
her quiet presence like a rare bloom opens in a field of snow where others tread too fast to see her pain.

Not unlike myself when I was born again and soon return to the ether and the mist.

If I could only be as you before I leave your world behind this pain and how it flow's it's now too much.

The sky, vast and soft in its blueness, cradles us both, and I see in it clouds that drift freely, untouched by others' unlearned judgments.

She lives in this quiet sky, outside the lines drawn by the hurried world.
I may not think like you, nor walk through life with the ease of those untouched by struggle, yet the dreams that found me as a young father have stayed by my side, as faithful as the stars I yearn to see.

It has taken me twenty years to put words like this to love, to feel that I can walk amongst you without fear, not asking for permission, but quietly, humbly, seeking only to be what I could have been before this road I walked.

There is a prayer I hold, like a soft shell kept in my open palm:
that you may see us—my daughter, myself—as we are, not apart from you but of you, no more, no less.

The sea and its waves welcome us both, its tides soothing us with the knowledge that we belong.
I pray, gently, for peace, for the world to hold us in understanding, if not in full, then at least in kindness.

Yours truly,
James McLain