He woke up each morning

To see his father

Bow his head and cry

Business lost

To urban renewal

The barbershop

Over-run

With scammers

Fast-talkers

Who wanted

A sip of JD

Instead of a

Haircut

“Howabout a loan

While you’re at it?”

“I’ll never end up

Like my father.”

He told himself.

Only to find

Twenty years later

He was worse

Than his father.

Smoking the coke

Substitute

To shut out

The voices raging

In his head

That you’re

Better off dead.

The father begats the son

The son rejects the father

The disappointment

The neglect

The mirror-image

Of defeat

And failure…

Then, in the end,

Embraces it.

Justifies it.

Endorses it…

But another son…

Sees his father

In the grip

Of middle-aged

Despair…

Of self-indulgent

Self-pity…

Of giving up

To the vagaries

Of life

Rather than fighting it.

This son…

Chooses

To walk away

From the past

From the demons

Of familial failure…

To blaze

His own destiny.