He was sitting at the bar alone.
His mind was reeling yet the poison he picked had never touched his lips.
He left behind a twenty 'cause he figured that the bartender's bill were paid only by tips.

He starts walking back to the place he calls home.
But, honestly, it should be called "house" because it's a place,
a shell, filled with lies and things unknown.
He's got a seventeen year old girl, a pretty little thing
with hair like night,
a loud bark, and a hard bite.
She slips out every twilight to paint the town red,
and to get some extra cash by givin' head.
Daddy thinks she'll make it through college cause she's working two jobs.
What he doesn't know is that of her innocence she's been robbed.

He walks into his son's room, and gives the sleeping boy a loving kiss on the forehead,
which is good, because that thirteen year old boy
could any day end up dead
for selling sugar on the wrong street corner.
He stamped and early expiration date on the very same forehead
that Daddy kisses every night.
False claiming at school earned him a fight
and a come-to-Jesus meeting
via an abandoned warehouse,
tattooed fists,
and a knife.

Daddy turns into husband as he climbs into bed.
He hugs close his wife of twenty years that secretly wishes
she were dead.
Dead with guilt she is because she knows that this man isn't
the father of one of her children.
Unfaithful she was those many years ago, but about this fact
her husband must never know.

Although,
as the man drifts away to dream land, he prays that his death comes soon.
Soon so that his much-loved family won't have enough time to worry about him or the pain he feels from the malignant tumors
that are scattered throughout his body.
The doctor had told him that he had six months
to a year left to live, but,
because he was refusing treatment,
the cancer had spread to his head.
And in less than six months,
he'd be dead.

So Doctor-man told him, "Go home and be with your family, the ones you love and that love you back."

So a penny for your thoughts, please, and answer me this:
Is honesty the best policy,
or is ignorance bliss?