Grant Me The Serenity

https://susanvespoli.com/

 Love when someone freshens a well worn phrase.

Here's the rest of her poem.

Namaste'

Ode to the Modified Serenity Prayer

      “Grant me the serenity to accept the people I cannot change,

      the courage to change the one I can, and the wisdom to know it’s me.”

Your daughter camps near the methadone

clinic in a sea of bench and canal sleepers.

She’s lost another phone or charger or backpack,

wears a ball cap over her sunburnt face.

You could tell her to go back to the hospital

or sober living or Soul Surgery Treatment Center

or the 90-day rehab she left after four days.

You could drive her to Walmart, the Dollar Store,

buy her a phone charger, more clothes, shoes,

instant coffee, oatmeal, peanut butter, candy,

wring your hands, feel sick to your stomach

as she smiles, climbs out of your car, saying, “Yes,

I’d rather live on the street.” You could pretend

she’s gone to Woodstock, that it’s 1969, that addicts

are just kids passing through a phase where they drop

acid, wear tie-dye, dance in the rain to Canned Heat.

Or you could repeat the modified serenity prayer

            over and over and over and over,

then drive home, park your car, kiss your own

goddamn good life just as four geese fly over

your flowered front yard and honk.