Andrew Fisher - The Promise lyrics

I – 1939 The man remains one summer at her side; Their child - a boy - a remnant of his time. Once the bells of Westminster chime wide He flees for home; both hearts still intertwined. She lays upon the rug and hides her shame Next to their child (half-Persian on his side) He Promises they'll love again some day. But hearts and minds, Pahlavi has his pride. The mother files the streets in fleeting fear - A Pierrot, with her white disguise and creed. She hides the baby, plays the ‘volunteer' And rallies for the British troops. Indeed. The tides will pa**, from Churchill to Japan And she will watch this boy become a man. II – 1948 There was no way to describe it. For the little boy, it was a sight to behold: the steel behemoth; the patina was greener than the water around it. A statue that screamed Freedom. Hope. Liberty. He turned around and saw his mother. She was bronze in the sun of the New York Bight. Then she pointed and waved, her smile not quite concealing the fear in her eyes. The boy turned again. This was a new emotion. His world was defined by colour, and this colour that he saw draped around the man who was waving back at his mother was familiar. It was his own colour. He looked down at his hands, examining them. Hiding. In ambient light, or the dead of night, he looked different and he knew it. His mother made no mention of it but the dirty looks he got at school that made his eyes well up with tears just confirmed it. His mother took his tinted hand. He was forced on to land. The place felt consuming. It seemed to have the protective film of something new and untouched. Too much. The boy protested. He sobbed and screamed and the mother did too, for she had dreamed of this moment for too long. She thrust him upon the familiar gentleman bearing the tan. This is your father. He'll make you a man. III – 1957 If words were able to convey a life thrown in to disarray then I'd hold my tongue and save the joy and scream those words on Father's Day. I wish for troops I could deploy to invade my brain and then destroy those memories that intertwine the road to eighteen from little boy. What kind of life was I consigned? We haven't got a single dime. My father made well sure of this when he f**ed off for the second time. To know my daddy still exists is made worse because I am unmissed. I want to forget. I want pearly white skin. I guess my pigmentation reminds me of him. IV – 1985 If rain had fallen down upon the green and cleansed away our traces in the mud, could our family demons washed clean? Or does bleach still reside within my blood? Her heart stopped beating in that bitter end. She didn't get her chance to reconcile with he, who hadn't ever spared the years to come back to their boy and make amends. But was my mother's life a life worthwhile? She never loved a man who ‘d quelled her tears. I had a tragic youth that was misspent and I reformed my life in middle age. I married well and loved with good intent but bear the scars of adolescent rage. But then when mum pa**ed on in to the light still there was a promise unfulfilled - a vow that had been made so long ago. A void that only one man could make right. I must reform the bond that had been k**ed: with that man I truly thought I'd never know. Shallowly he'll pay his last respects to a life he thought that he had left behind. I wonder if he's lived without regrets I dread to think that I've escaped his mind. He'd told that woman after she had bore The son that he abandoned out of fear that they would love again upon the tide of time that pa**ed them since the War. Can he make things right now that he's here? Can he look his dead ex-wife right in the eye? There was no delight; no warm embrace. Father, son; two men. We're both disgraced. Yet here we are together once again. My bleached, burnt hand is offered for amends.