The Paper

A high school
English teacher
Was going through
A box of old essays
His students had written
When he came upon
One by a student
He remembered well.
She had been a brilliant
But troubled girl,
Who had committed suicide
Three years before.
It was a paper
In which she expressed
Her feelings
Towards her parents.
And it was immediately clear
They needed to see
The words she had written.
Her parents had split apart,
But he managed to locate
Both of them.
She had described her father
As a jerk,
But stated she loved him anyway.
That was enough
To move the father to tears
Because the first part he knew,
But the second part he didn’t.
She had written of the love
She had for her mother,
And when her mother
Saw the words of her daughter,
She broke down
And cried as well.
Finally she said to him
“You can’t possibly know
What this means to me!
I tore myself apart for years
Wondering what I did wrong.
The answer is plain to see,
Absolutely nothing!
I loved her with all my heart
And she loved me as well!”