Father's Day '11

With pen to paper and paper to pen
Maybe you can find knowledge from the life I lived in
I remember my mom telling me to speak to a man
I peaked at him as I hid my eyes behind my little hands
I didn’t want to leave my mother’s side
I recognized the man but I wanted to hide
He picked me up, hugged me, and kissed me
He put me down I ran to my mother
He looked at me and said son I’m your daddy
But war kept taking my daddy away from me
Days turned into months, months turned into years
When he finally came home there were no cheers
Just the memory of seeing my mother’s tears
Those tears have haunted me all these years
Seeing tears like that because of me is one of my biggest fears

Dear father thank you
Dear father I love you
Thank you father for all you’ve done
Trying to make my world a better one
Without you father I’d be a different man
Learning through you father I’m a better man
And when I have a son hopefully he’ll see I’m doing the best I can

The military does something to a man
Unless you’ve experience war you’ll never understand
Even standing by his side it was like something unknown
One day I’m going to have a son
I’m going to tell him about my father being a great man
The man that told me he was doing the best he can
At being a husband, father and an American
Fighting all that comes with being a black man
There’s a cost to freedom it ain’t free
That cost was paid by my father and me
There was another that had to pay a price
Some of those years weren’t so nice
My mother a strong independent woman
Held fast to what she believed in
Sometimes I wonder what it would have been like if she had left this man

Dear father thank you
Dear father I love you
Thank you father for all you’ve done
Trying to make my world a better one
Without you father I’d be a different man
Learning through you father I’m a better man
And when I have a son hopefully he’ll see I’m doing the best I can

I used to wonder everyday
If things could be different than this way
All I ever wanted was to be like the other boys
Have my father play with me and my toys
Do things with me not just around me
Together father and son in unity
Discipline was given with a heavy hand
Respect was constantly on demand
I couldn’t say yes sir and no sir when I hardly knew the man
But there was always a strange connection
It took years to realize like father like son
I tried to learn from everything that I lived through
So when I was older hopefully I would know what to do
And with that I learned I wanted to be the best one
The best son to my father and the best father to my son

Dear father thank you
Dear father I love you
Thank you father for all you’ve done
Trying to make my world a better one
Without you father I’d be a different man
Learning through you father I’m a better man

And when I have a son hopefully he’ll see I’m doing the best I can

An excerpt from the KgB pAIN b4 pLEASURE project...