My Daughter's Friend by Mark Spencer

My daughter's name is Kristen.
And she is twenty three.

She just completed college,
With a bachelor's degree.

She wants to earn her masters,
Go on to practice law.

She makes me very happy,
In fact I am in awe.

To think I could have lost her,
That she could have met her end.

And shared the fate of Andrea,
Who was my daughter's friend.

The girls grew up together,
They were friends from the start.

Sharing nearly everything,
They were rarely apart.

Just on Sunday mornings
Did they separate at all.

You'd find Kristen at our church,
And Andrea at the mall.

It was only on this matter
They did not see eye to eye.

Though it became a problem,
As the years went by.

Her parents taught Andrea,
Since she was very small,

That if she couldn't see God,
He wasn't there at all.

But she'd started asking questions,
They thought Kristen inspired.

So an end to the friendship,
Is what they both required.

And that was the beginning,
For my daughter's friend.

She fell into depression,
Started wishing for the end.

Three times she tried to kill herself,
And three times she did fail.

Her parents tried to save her,
In the end to no avail.

Andrea was determined,
To, this time, find success.

It was sleep that she desired,
To end all this distress.

So on her sixteenth birthday,
When all had gone to bed,

She took too many sleeping pills,
In the morning she was dead.

This devastated Kristen,
That now her friend was gone.

She said it was their friendship,
That kept her hanging on.

Andrea talked of suicide
In my daughter she'd confide.

She said she was uncertain
What would happen if she died.

She wanted just to go to sleep,
Like her parents said she would.

But if there really was a God
The result would not be good.

So she started asking questions,
To help her in her search.

She even asked her parents
If she could go to church.

But that just made them angry,
This nonsense had to end.

That's when they told Andrea,
She was not my daughter's friend.

So without Kristen's friendship,
To help her through it all,

And no answers to her questions,
She had not far to fall.

But she was not the only one,
The thought crossed Kristen's mind.

Like it does many teenagers,
When hope is hard to find.

For the girls there was one difference,
Kristen would later say.

You taught me to believed in God,
That's why I'm here today.

For he gave to me this life,
For better or for worse.

I can treat it as a blessing,
Or treat it as a curse.

Now we both count our blessings
And thank God every day.

That He helped us through that crisis,
And brought us here today.

So if you don't believe in God,
That is your right to choose.

But if your children want to learn,
Don't be hasty to refuse.

They may not reveal their reasons
Until the bitter end.

When you put them in the ground
Beside my daughter's friend.

lasohnda harris (12.229.199.53) -- Thursday, February 27 2003, 11:14 am

that was very tuching and true
I like it keep wroting that was very true ans touching

Lori Ann Day (198.81.26.142) -- Friday, February 28 2003, 03:25 am

Mark, I think that it was a terrible thing that Andrea never got the chance to know more about what she wanted to know, and that suicide was the sad result. Blind people don't see, and yet, the world still exists. Though we don't see God, we can see everything that lives. We can't see the thunder, but we surely hear it crashing. God planted a garden when nobody was home. Just because nobody was there when we arrived, it doesn't mean that He's not there. The evidence still exists. If there wasn't a God, why would Andrea's parents have to deny that He exists? I love the poem!

dsda (24.72.92.94) -- Tuesday, March 18 2003, 11:00 pm

adada
i dont know what to say and i know that saying good job wont mean anything to you because you already know it is but i would just like to say that this is 100 percent true like so many teens searching for something more

ivonne (65.40.33.132) -- Tuesday, September 23 2003, 09:41 pm

no title
thank you for sharing your story

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