How Dad's Mind Works

“Life is not a movie,” he said to his daughter.

(‘Surely that is not my voice,
not me speaking,’
he thinks softly to himself
in an aside to his conscience.)

“There is no script. No plot.
The ending is not always happy,
neither is it hopeless,
as it often is in the noir genre.”

(‘Christ, are you a pompous ass
or what?’ His conscience replies.
‘Give her something useful,
some timeless bon mot
that speaks of life in harmony
or the perfection of love.
Something that says you’re sympathetic.’)

“What I mean to say is life is hard. It requires effort.
Participation.”

(‘That’s better, but find a positive
before you bring this to completion,’
he thinks, growing warm to his task,
‘You could knock the girl over with a feather
she is so fragile, right now’.)

“You cannot sit back and watch. You have to live it.
I know it’s hard to fathom that things can, let alone will,
get better. But they will, sweetheart. I promise.
You’re smart. You’re beautiful.”

(‘Boy, she sure has the best of her mother!’)

“Don’t roll your eyes! Everyone says that, not just me!
Just find that toughness I know you have inside.
Don’t let other people dictate your spirit to you!
Be who you are and true friends will flock to you
while false friends will fade away. OK?”

(‘Please be OK!’ his mind implores.

‘She will,’ his conscience confidently answers.)

Note: Same ten words from Katie: movie, hopeless, timeless, harmony, perfection, completion, feather, fathom. Similarities, yet different. This one was written first but I had forgotten about it. Surprised when I found it. I tweaked it a little. Beauty of jigsaw poems is the words can be revisited to see what else comes out! What do you think?