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You Tell us, Mommy and Daddy
she couldn’t carry the weight
of the lack of loving
she walked around with it on her back
the heavy baggage in her sack
she can’t believe what it’s becoming
the complete lack of loving
acting like you love them
but an actor you are not
the longer they stay
the more they both pay
their heartless “love in a knot
boiling in a shallow pot
we don’t want to see you suffer
we don’t want to see you unhappy
you tell us that it’s not our fault
you tell us, mommy and daddy.
three years have passed since you
set free the wrecking ball
know he knows another family
that hasn’t been introduced to me
sometimes I don’t want to think at all
of how every night he would call
three years have passed since you
divided our home in two
and now she’s looking for a job
and I clean up after the slob
she’s seeing other people, too
though I don’t always know who
both of them use up their phones
talking with their new “friends”
she’s behind a locked door, laughing
and he goes to Alabama by cashing
we don’t know what kind of feelings to send
because we never expected to see the end
we don’t want to see you suffer
we don’t want to see you unhappy
you tell us that it’s not our fault
you tell us, mommy and daddy.
she’s lost the weight that was on her
and he’s moved to a new home
I wish we could be together again
but I guess our family is a has-been
I go through feelings with a fine-tooth comb
I wish those outsiders would go home
we don’t want to see you suffer
we don’t want to see you unhappy
you tell us that it’s not our fault
you tell us, mommy and daddy.
we don’t know what kind of feelings to send
because we never expected to see the end.
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This article has 3 comments.
the narrator is the kids. The whole thing is from the kids' point of view.
My mom was literally "carrying the weight" (she was bigger than she is now) and that was part of the "suffering" that i was talking about. We didn't want to see our parents fight and not get along. That was the first 2 lines of the chorus.
Could you explain who the narrator is in this poem? It seems like the first two stanzas are about the mom, but who says the chorus? It seems like the "we" is the parents and the "you" is by the kids?
I love how this poem follows the family through the divorce and the birth of new families and how the poem still treats this new life with skepticism, that you can't just move on.
My parents divorced a decade ago (I was 12) and I'm still reeling from the effects; I find there are some things I've snagged on and can't move on from.