poems of forgiveness

we've been reading poems of apology and forgiveness
the first half of the book are apologies - in particular there's one where a boy tells his dad he's truly sorry for making a dumb choice and breaking not one, but two, windows with a rock...
his father's response of forgiveness is my favorite poem of the book

I'm telling you now

Son, I kept telling you
I couldn't write a poem
and you kept saying just
write a list of how
you feel and break it
into shorter lines like
we do at school
and I kept thinking I
did lousy in school,
every single year almost
and barely made it through and
I never told you about that,
always on you to work harder,
even though I barely tried,
always messing around
like I knew better, but really
just scared because it didn't
come natural for me like
for some, and now here you
are keeping up with the smart kids
and more sometimes and
writing poetry and all and even
getting your old man to write
all these lines, and I want to
say what I'm feeling, which
is I'm proud, real proud
of you, I couldn't be prouder
and somehow I've written
this poem if you could
call it that and christ
forget about the window
it's ancient history