White Oak Doors

Lost in your own head

But then a knock at the door

Put down that drink

Your steps creaking the floor

Go and get the gun

Distract yourself from death

Back against the door

Your hands are starting to sweat

Slowly cock the gun

Slowly move to the side

Slowly turn the handle

Slowly open it wide

Catch a glimpse of his face

Your heart sinks in your chest

Your hands start to shake

Because you know it’s him

Just the coward and you

Standing silent, dead air

So you pull him inside

Into your father’s chair

“Your mother is dead

All thanks to you

Her addiction got worse

After you left, you damned fool

What you did to our father

I promised you’d pay up

I’m going to take your life

It don’t feel like enough”

Cold steel to his head

Walk him to his death

Walk him down past the white oak doors

Walk him out past the boardwalk, your old shipyard

Pistol in his side, make him pay

On the outskirts of town, pass the quarry now

Walk him down to those cold steel tracks

You stumble drunk with the gun in his back

“Now get down on your knees

On the tracks where you shamed me

But this time, the dodge ain’t going to end so pretty

Either a bullet or that train

Steaming just ahead

Is going to end your days

You coward little kid”

You sit and you stir

While he waits for his death

You’ll never forgive him

And you never did forget

He’ll never see the sun again

Make him pay off his debt

Stand on those tracks, cold steel under feet

Barrel to his temple “Your addict mother, you will soon re-meet”

Whisper in his ear, feel his whole body shake

In an instant he’s got your arm, got your gun, held by his weight

You feel the cold steel above and below

Your stomach tie in knots as the train whistle blows

Feel the warm of the blood where the barrel digs in

From your cheek to your mouth, you taste the sweat and the tin

You don’t cry, you don’t beg

You’ve been waiting for this

For the coward, or for death

Just to see your wife again

That train is so close, so loud and so clear

Your hands stop shaking and it’s all that you hear

Just like father

“You took him

If this is how it’s going to be

I’d rather die… at the hands of… my own… family”