Maybe A Thousand Times Poem by Gert Strydom

(for Daleen)

I have cried for you
have prayed for you many more,
have loved you earnestly and true
knew that you me too do adore

but you and your grown up offspring

did turn my life upside down.
I have seen you smile very happy,
have seen you frown,
have even heard you curse me

have with joy heard you sing

and far too many times we did fight
over nonessential things
and you had been my happiness and delight,
the one who gave my life wings

who daily did affect my living.

To me you are simply really lovely
and do bring beautiful things to my life
but I do not have the ability to make you happy
as a partner and a wife

as in your mind there is always something bothering

but some people think that we are incompatible
and about our love they simply do not care
do constantly create situations that are combustible
but where they do not belong they time and again dare

and in all of this far too much has become the hurting.

Where we are separate, apart and divorced I do feel broken
and now all of your grown children's insults, curses and assaults
are raw and constantly in my mind but this remains unspoken
where every time it was not really my fault

and I have become afraid of snapping and reciprocating,
of doing to them painful things that sting and sting.

© Gert Strydom