real life

i watched too much t.v.
when i was little
i thought that when i ran off
someone would always come looking

i thought that if someone said
'i'm sorry' then
everything would be
alright again

i believed that if you
said 'i love you'
then the other person
would cry and say it back

i wanted
a perfect world
a little house on the prairie
a life on walton's mountain

i wanted to be dr. huxtable's daughter
where laughter was the norm
and even when you messed up
you knew you were loved

but things weren't always solved
in 30 minutes
sometimes it never got solved
at all

and sometimes people went away
and never came back
sometimes people died
no matter how much you loved them

and sometimes
people didn't love you
no matter how much your heart
ached and expanded and threatened to break

the story didn't always have
a happy ending
and people weren't always
alright

everything didn't always have a reason
or an explanation
that made the bad stuff
easier to take

laura ingalls got a career
on the lifetime channel
pa ingalls died
of pancreatic cancer

mr walton was a drunk

real life just didn't always
have a beautiful sunset
or peaceful music
while the credits rolled

but i learned somewhere
to ride the waves
to trust the waters
to sustain me

i found that one person
who would love me
no matter what
which made everything else bearable

and i learned
that love truly is the answer
though it's not always perfect
not always neat

i learned
that it's ok when someone can't
love you back
and there is a time to move on

and if i know nothing else
of God
i know that God is life
God is love

and God is the sustaining power
that has given me
hope against hope
and the will to live

in a sometimes
disappointing

world.