The Things I Taught You
when I read about the poet
who seemingly lost everything
including her use as a mother,
returned to poetry as solace
to repair what had been broken
like a vase ruined by a small child,
i could relate, being the father
in the Cat Steven’s song
Cat’s In The Cradle,
reflecting on what I had taught you that you seemingly already knew,
knowing everything about hope and love and the way not to conduct a meaningless life
where your children would
eventually try to leave, like birds that fly
south and never return, because home is a theory of where people think you should be
not where you are and flying there admits defeat, and no one wants that. no father wants that
for his own, still, when something
breaks, you can hear it for miles,
ringing in your ears like love.