I often think about the day when my
beautiful 5 year old daughter begins to trace
the strange lines that are on her
mama's wrists and the day
she notices the white lines
on her mama's legs.
So the day she finally asks
what happened
the way children do,
I will tell her this;
Baby girl, sometimes life gets too hard
and you feel like you cant breathe anymore.
Sometimes you think that your tummy shouldn't rise up
and down anymore and that you don't
deserve to eat as much ice cream as you want on hot days
or that a boy doesn't love you so you
need something else to fill the emptiness.
Sometimes you give in to the mean voices in
your head and don't know where to go.
But baby girl,
when that day comes I will hold you
and protect you the way mothers should
and I will fight off all those demons
and make sure you know just how beautiful
you are.
I promise you, I will not leave
you alone in the dark and that I will take you
driving if you need that or bring you
places that make you feel whole.
And baby girl, if the day ever comes where
you think you can never win again,
I will drive us to the ocean that very day
so you can stand by me
and dip your toes
in to the biggest infinity
the globe has to offer.
We will collect shells and see broken
beautiful things
and the sand that is better with
other things
and on that day,
I promise you I will not leave.
And sweet daughter of mine,
I promise I will love you
no matter how bad things are
or how terrible you feel.
Because I never want you
to feel how I have.
I want to protect you,
I never want you to have to tell your
little girl stories like this.
But if you do,
I will love you.
There is nothing
in this universe you could do
that could make me stop
loving you
my beautiful daughter.