Lessons in Love – Unconditional Forgiveness
(Mother’s Day Tribute)
written by: Charlie Bottle
@CharlieBottle
When we come into this world
to learn of love in struggle,
we strive through tight spaces
helped along by strong muscles
from the comfort of the womb,
suffering and pain floods
the mind and body
and tattoos your first experience
of maternal unconditional love,
when the new skin lays on yours
when your heart comforts your child.
The second lesson in the height of love
is when you wake from fitful sleep
to feed the hungry, crying infant
who depends on you for sustenance,
the cleaning and bathing and caring
the tedium that brings purpose
and joy despite the sacrifices
demanded on the altars of maternal love.
Many are the lessons learned
at each milestone of the child’s life
as you teach it of love,
it will teach you of forgiveness
unconditional love, unadulterated joy,
it will teach you of innocence
and of the purity of thought
and the beauty of a heart
untainted by selfishness and greed.
The journey into adulthood begins
the desires to increase one’s territory
without boundaries and constraints,
without realizing the perils
and falls, and traps on the way,
we try to educate, elucidate, enlighten
explain the whereto’s and why’s
but a new love is in the eyes
blinds the consequential realities.
It is then your unconditional love is tested
“can the anchor hold firm the ship,
in the tempest-tossed sea?”
and the one stirring the teacup
is your once innocent baby.
It is here unconditional love
calls for an ally from the past,
the one thing you learned
from your then innocent child,
Unconditional Forgiveness.
Hard as it may seem
many a night we spent in prayer
for when the house was fast asleep,
our whispered prayers filled the air,
for despair and hand wringing
never calmed frustration
or did it any of the fears repair,
we prayed for peace, love, comfort
to fill our souls, for peace and understanding
to fill our lives, despite the pain we felt
the heartbreaks and anguish
the blame game that we failed
failed to raise a perfect child.
The child thinks it is perfect,
it has done no wrong,
why do adults interfere
and old people always stymie
their lives of fun and parties?
After God, no one loves you more
than those who cared for and loved you,
who took care of your every need,
who bound your wounds and nursed you
and did what your friends never would.
So we will be the first ones to say
after you have had your way,
“Please forgive me!
I am sorry!
I Love You!
Thank You!”
and we hope someday
you will remember these words
when you have walked these streets
and reached this crossroad
at which unconditional love, humility,
forgiveness and compassion reside,
the roads which are paved with Mercy
and the shop window dressed with memories
of moments of the unconditional love
lit by the light of the years gone by.
Someday you will remember
and tears cry for the angels and saints
who did their best to enrich your lives.
- University of Aging - September 25, 2024
- Silence Lets Delusion Rule - July 22, 2024
- Mercy Heals All Wounds - May 13, 2024
