Easier To Run

She stands tall and proud with a smile that could kill,
Telling those old love stories with definite skill,
And she chokes back her tears with the whiskey,
As she smiles, seeing so much of him in me.

Holding that old photograph, she stops and sighs,
And it's easy to see the horrid pain flow in her eyes,
But she looks at me and smiles and says: "Look at us!
We'd always go down that dirt road, kicking up the dust -

My Mom would yell at me when I came home at night,
Telling me I didn't know what I was doing, that it wasn't right,
But we were so naive, nothing could keep us apart,
So I didn't listen to her, I just followed my foolish heart."

And she holds that photograph as she looks over to me,
Smiling the best that she can but it's easy to see -
The pain that she keeps hidden inside of her head,
But she looks to me, with her eyes bloodshot red -

"I still remember when he sat and held my hand,
He was still so poor, couldn't afford no wedding band,
Said he'd always be by my side when all is said and done -"
She lowered her head and sighed: "It was easier to run."

-Jenna Elphick
May 13, 2007