Maybe the serenity to cope with the things we cannot change can give us the strength to change what we can? 

xxx

Poem for a sad daughter- by Michael Ondaatje ( my mums favourite writer)

All night long the hockey pictures 
gaze down at you 
sleeping in your tracksuit. 
Belligerent goalies are your ideal. 
Threats of being traded 
cuts and wounds 
--all this pleases you. 
O my god! you say at breakfast 
reading the sports page over the Alpen 
as another player breaks his ankle 
or assaults the coach. 

When I thought of daughters 
I wasn't expecting this 
but I like this more. 
I like all your faults 
even your purple moods 
when you retreat from everyone 
to sit in bed under a quilt. 
And when I say 'like' 
I mean of course 'love' 
but that embarrasses you. 
You who feel superior to black and white movies 
(coaxed for hours to see Casablanca) 
though you were moved 
by Creature from the Black Lagoon. 

One day I'll come swimming 
beside your ship or someone will 
and if you hear the siren 
listen to it. For if you close your ears 
only nothing happens. You will never change. 

I don't care if you risk 
your life to angry goalies 
creatures with webbed feet. 
You can enter their caves and castles 
their glass laboratories. Just 
don't be fooled by anyone but yourself. 

This is the first lecture I've given you. 
You're 'sweet sixteen' you said. 
I'd rather be your closest friend 
than your father. I'm not good at advice 
you know that, but ride 
the ceremonies 
until they grow dark. 

Sometimes you are so busy 
discovering your friends 
I ache with loss 
--but that is greed. 
And sometimes I've gone 
into my purple world 
and lost you. 

One afternoon I stepped 
into your room. You were sitting 
at the desk where I now write this. 
Forsythia outside the window 
and sun spilled over you 
like a thick yellow miracle 
as if another planet 
was coaxing you out of the house 
--all those possible worlds!-- 
and you, meanwhile, busy with mathematics. 

I cannot look at forsythia now 
without loss, or joy for you. 
You step delicately 
into the wild world 
and your real prize will be 
the frantic search. 
Want everything. If you break 
break going out not in. 
How you live your life I don't care 
but I'll sell my arms for you, 
hold your secrets forever. 

If I speak of death 
which you fear now, greatly, 
it is without answers. 
except that each 
one we know is 
in our blood. 
Don't recall graves. 
Memory is permanent. 
Remember the afternoon's 
yellow suburban annunciation. 
Your goalie 
in his frightening mask 
dreams perhaps 
of gentleness.

by Michael Ondaatje