Dear Mom and Dad

Here's why I can't home

I can talk to either one of you just fine

When it's either one, alone



But the Thanksgiving table

Is going to be pulled out bigger

If we talk at all

One of you will pull the trigger



I used to run those battle lines

Trying to smooth over what got said

Trying to get a medal

Trying to get some shrapnel in my head

Thought it was my duty

to plead and to implore

But I caught too much crossfire

In your covert war



The television talks, fills the air

So you don't have to start

You claim you territories in the rooms upstairs

To keep yourselves apart



Holy days they bring us all together

After so much left unsaid

You taught us well not to kick under the table

Kick under your breath instead



I used to stand between you

Trying to smooth over what got said

Trying to get a medal

Trying to get some shrapnel in my head



Thought it was my duty

To plead and to implore

But I caught too much crossfire

In your covert war



Of coarse there was the anger where the love is strong

It spilled like gasoline

It's crude but its a power we can draw upon

If it fuels the right machine



I love you and I'd never want to see you bleed

When comments cut like steel

So to hold your fire I'd block the shot and take the hit for you

As if I could not feel



I thought they'd passed right through me

That I had no scars to hide

But now I open up and try to love

And I find they're still inside



I used to run those battle lines trying to plead and to implore

Please won't you hold the cease fire out a little longer

Until the next uproar



I took it all in childhood

But I can't take it no more

'cause I caught too much crossfire

In your covert war