Dear Pop, the fear stopped me from saying this before

But I’m

Grown up, so I’m going to lay it on the floor

It’s time to own up, you’re pumping your liver with liquor

I shiver, you’re getting sicker

Swallowing liquid slivers, drowning in whiskey rivers

For ten years

I let it fly with wings clipped, flight risk

Can’t live to watch you die like this

And I remember when I was a kid looking for my dad but all day’s busy

7 pm hits then the whiskey on your breath spun a small boy dizzy

Got the fam saying, “Who is he?”

Then the hourglass cracked, matched with that sour mash Jack

How is that trap, Dad?

Now you’re on your last lap trying to tap dance between fact and a flask

I remember when we packed in that van down to Florida

Mom said you was a goner, call the coroner

She said you loved that whore more than her

And I sat stirred like what the fuck is lady luck proving?

You moved in with that 86 proof

Actually mix in the solution

The battery of my disillusion

And I know this is useless, so be it with the rest

But I had to get it off of my head and out of my chest

And

I’m watching you washing it down

Watching you drown

Lost in the now, lost in the then

Trying to find the zen with a frost-bitten frown

Every night you left your son behind the Earth

But instead of the hurt I learned how the moon works

Got wise, nowadays I stop by

See the same eyes rolled back in your eyelids

Passed out, man down

I’m a siren screaming silent in this glass house

I didn’t want to make this sound cause I’m that proud

But I’m trying to be a man

Plus trying to find my dad some land to land

He’s drowning in Jack Dan quicksand

Doing all he can to keep the fam together plus stand the weather

Dad, I understand the pressure

Trying to pay the bills plus kill life’s ills

But out of that fracture none of that mattered //

We needed a role model

Not a robot who holds bottles just to chase the day

I hate to see you waste away

Your face decays and fades to grey

But damn, Dad, you’re the greatest man I know when you’re sober

But I watch you transform into a king cobra

Once that drink soaks up in your blood

And I’m proud to be your son

But I can’t

Act passive, can’t stand back or laugh at it

The sad fact is we’re

All addicts

You’ve got one wife who’s heart’s broken

Two sons

Pot smoking

One daughter out roaming

Four people that knew

You before you got loaded

It might be a lost notion but it’s time to stop soaking

You’ve got a bottle of Jack and a bleeding hand

It’s osmosis to a decent man

You used to read it, Dad, Hop on Pop //

Now you’re lost on scotch

“sad dad, bad, had”

My last gasp and I’m through with it

I just wish that you could quit

It’s a bad taste

And I’m watching you washing it down

Watching you drown

Lost in the now, lost in the then

Trying to find a zen with a frost bitten frown