Verse 1
I'm haunted by that one-night/ cigarettes and bud-light/ 
Needles and prescription bottles anger his blood-type/ 
Silhouettes of his belt off and hand cocked-back/
So many welts she lost-track/ and she never fought-back/
And all you could hear was her scream with her mouth-closed/  
Because a good mother hides her pain from the rest of the house-hold/
And he never held-back/ every time we heard the belt-slap/ 
He feasted on our fear and I'd swear to God I felt-that/ 
He fell on the couch/ with a beer in his hand and passed-out/
So she pulled her bags-out/ and left me in the trashed-house/
She knelt down to leave one kiss/ still swollen from punches/
Her heart plummets/ and will never know what love is/
And what he touches/ he destroys/ I can still hear the noise/
I can still feel the void/ and the fear he enjoyed/ 
So I sat down and gazed at the belt he always hit-us-with/ 
The needle where he'd get-his-fix/ and the heroin he'd get-it-with/
And as I watched the cigarette burn down in his ash-tray/
I filled up his needle and I pulled the belt up his arm half-way/ 
I tightened it like he taught me/ and injected it into his body/
He opened his eyes softly/ and I told him that I was sorry/
As his pupil rolled back into his eyelids/ it's set in stone/
He became lifeless/ so I put on my headphones/
On the couch in an empty house with my dad next to me/
The needle stuck out his arm I push play and blared public enemy/ 

It’s a long road filled with obstacles and pot holes
It’s a long road it takes a toll to heal those lost souls/ 
It’s a long road far from home I walk slow/
taking the path less traveled when I take the long road/

Verse 2
For months I went to bed but I never slept/ I never cried/ 
I never dreamt cause my dreams lied/ whenever I tried/ 
And I was scared of strange beds where monsters grow/
With a family I'd never know/ thrown into a foster home/
By myself with my smile buried I was alone and scared/
But there another alone in there/ and I know she cared/
She watched my heart and from that time we were never apart/
up late at night and talked cause she was afraid of the dark/ 
And I'd listen to every story some true some far fetched/ 
She showed me the scar on her neck/ and told me about the car wreck/
And how here parents died/ and how her brain swelled just enough/ 
She became afraid of the dark cause she couldn't see for months/
Some times it was too much to take/ both scared stuck and awake/ 
Listening to the radio late/ for new songs to dub to some tapes/ 
It was our love our escape/ and like me… the music got to her/ 
two kids in foster care/ torn apart when someone adopted her/
and I had nothing to give her except the tapes we collected together/
we were unexpectedly severed/ and she always said she'd be there forever/ 
but she didn’t... so I brought myself to a place to hate her/ 
I closed my eyes to hide my tears and pushed play on the tape player and

It’s a long road filled with obstacles and pot holes
It’s a long road it takes a toll to heal those lost souls/ 
It’s a long road far from home I walk slow/
taking the path less traveled when I take the long road/

Verse 3 
Now time came and went/ and I always learned to change with it/
I was up to facing it/ but adoption I just wasn’t made for it/
Regardless a pastor brought me home to raise me/
Hell bent on trying to change me/ taking my music to restrain me/ 
And when he spanked me I hit him back/ opinions I’ll give them that/ 
But don’t make me follow what I don’t believe so “GOD” I ain’t I living that/ 
And I don’t need my tape player/ I learned to write rhymes myself/ 
And I don’t need father’s discipline I have a lifetime of welts/
But as God would have it/ that summer we got new neighbors/
And they had an adopted girl my age and she had my tape player/
She had the mixed tapes and of course the scars on her neck/
She had my heart It was hers to take/ but it was hardened to death/
And we cried we hugged/ and it slowly softened from her love/
To me that was enough she kept telling me that’s not what it was/ 
She said she’s no longer scared of the dark/ but she still stayed with me/
She wouldn’t lay with me but we held hands and she began pray with me/
And I resisted but each word that was spoken seemed to buckle my knees/
Each word made me feel broken I white knuckled and squeezed/
I couldn’t breathe and I have no strength Oh God I don’t deserve this/
I stayed on my knees I trembled in his grace and became his servant/
And I married that girl she’s sitting right over there in the front row/
I owe her the world but I kept my promise and I never let her go/
And my father never gave up on me and he never gave in/
And now I’m here to take up as pastor for the church God gave him/