Fred Small - Leslie Is Different lyrics

The neighbor up the road brought the message Joe and May never had a phone Five children grown and gone to college Now they lived out on Pewaukee Lake alone And the nurse at the big Milwaukee hospital Said "We've got a baby here with no eyes It's retarded, it's got cerebral palsy Six months old living only to die And we remembered the tiny Englishwoman Used to hire out as a nurse-governess May Lemke, will you take this broken child off our hands?" And God loves a fool 'cause she said yes, she said Refrain: Leslie is different Like everyone in the world He's kind of awkward, he's kind of fragile Kind of graceful, kind of tough He's kind of slow, he's kind of clever He's just Leslie and that's enough He just lay there helpless and silent Not a tear, not a smile, not a word But they held him and rocked him and sang him to sleep And talked to him as if he really heard And he grew with the sun and affection Though his body was spindly and small And a hundred times they stood him with his hands upon the fence And a hundred times watched him fall And their daughters warned it was useless They said, "Mama, that boy will break your heart" She said, "Love never comes easy And miracles mostly come hard," she said Refrain May used to play the piano And sing the old songs from the war There was always music on the radio And the records she bought at the store And sometimes they swore he was listening Though of course there was no way to know Maybe he was flying in his own blue sky Where no one else would ever go Maybe he was lost in a forest Where demons and woodspirits dwell But for sixteen years he had never spoke a word Never taken one step for himself, but they said Refrain Along about three in the morning A ripple of music broke the night Joe's fallen asleep at the TV again May reached over to turn on the light But the music kept getting louder And the TV was quiet and cold Leslie was playing the piano And his fingers were agile and bold A Tchaikovsky piano concerto Like water breaking over a dam A river of ecstasy flowed through his hands And each note cried out, "I am!" because Refrain