A father, teaching his son to be less afraid,
on steps, each higher, bade him jump. Again
and again, his father catches him, and trades
the risk for open arms, for love unfeigned.
But he steps aside. The boy then falls, face pale
against the floor. His father tells him: trust
completely none, not even me. This tale
is brutal. Betrayal always is. Unjust
it is but mires us nonetheless: the frost
that early comes, the love unhinged, the knees
that buckle climbing up a curb, the lost
belief that living comes with skeleton keys.
Betrayals seed hard hopes a soul might live:
Mud-buried hearts can bloom when they forgive.
-Kitty Yanson
Memorizing the Laws of Gravity 
Lovely… but hard…but forgiveness sentiment is a hopeful ending…
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So love this beautiful picture. And your reflection on betrayal painful but accurate. There is something about that father that I’ve always found troubling. Intentionality rather than accident?
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It has always bothered me too, Jeanne. I would like to think it accident, but fear it is intentionality, a harsh, harsh way of preparing a child for life, but so many of us are victims of this harsh way of parental teaching, perhaps not as bad as this. But what does one do with the betrayal as one grows up? Continuing the harshness against oneself or passing it on to others? How does one deal with the betrayal of one’s body whose only sin was to bear us?
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What of the psychology of the betrayer? Enjoyment of the other’s pain, misjudgment of one’s own culpability, ignorance in self-absorption? Too hard to think of deliberate training for life’s pitfalls: there must be trust, or at least, getting back up. Agreed: forgiveness is key.
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