FOB
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There was no boat, this man got off a plane
With a foreign degree, a year’s savings to his name
He’s married a pretty wife, got a baby on the way
Startin’ a new life in a new land this day
He’s got so many plans, his mind is never idle,
He names himself Peter, straight from the bible
A good white name for a good model man
He even adds a “b” to his surname “Lam”
‘Cause he wants to fit into lists of good white names
Wants to watch hockey and learn good white games
In this brave new world, he wants to make his mark
To see his family stay well away from the dark
Shit he saw growin’ up in the good old country
The violence and need, the weak and the hungry
‘Cause he’ll be damned if he’ll raise a child in that
He would sacrifice everything that he had
To make sure his kin get a good and happy start
To see his son grow up capable and smart
To buy his wife everything she could desire
To settle down nicely, live to see a grandsire
So he teaches his boy the best way he knows how,
Math and problem-solving with a strict and furrowed brow
His child will grow up confident and able
With a studious demeanor, a job that is stable
But something is happening, complex and unseen
This boy is growin’ up alienated and weak
He eats strange food with a pair of wooden sticks
His classmates taunt him, stretch their eyes for kicks
They sing songs ’bout how he grabs his dad’s ass
Takes a deep breath, loves suckin’ in that gas
And against all of this he cannot say shit
‘Cause it’s six big white boys and one little nip
Or slit or slant, it don’t matter to them
A chink in a chain, let’s hear it again!
So everyday at school it’s the same old shit
Taunts and insults and bleeding swollen lips
The more he fights back the more he is fucked
‘Cause there’s no support at home for that stuff
Keep your head down, stay humble and quiet
Don’t make a fuss, work hard, don’t riot
So he’s always last when he’s picked for a team
He doesn’t wanna play the kids are so mean
On that field he feels so goddamn inferior
When it’s outside or in, he always picks the interior
Works on remainders, multiplying fractions
Integral calculus, chemical reactions
He can map a complex digit in three planes
But he can’t even ask out his cute crush Jane
There is something inside him, holding him back
A deep-seated fear he needs to attack
But he don’t know how, he can’t volley a ball
He can swim okay, but that’s about all
So he buries his head in papers and pencils
Feels like his life has been placed in a stencil
As long as you draw in these bounds it’s okay
Woah, you want your own shape, no fuckin’ way!
He likes to read books about heroic deeds
Likes to write stories and draw what he reads
But it’s just a hobby, “Don’t encourage that shit”
Thinks his dad who’d explode if he were to quit
A traditional school for art and story-telling
So it’s no surprise that they both start yelling
At the top of their lungs when he’s done highschool
Pick a practical program, don’t be a damn fool!
‘Cause Peter has seen what happens to dumb dreamers
They ain’t the ones out there in the beemers
Their stomachs are empty, their eyes are so sad
To be a failure and hungry, there’s nothing so bad
So it’s a college education for son
To be economically viable when done
It’s about rep and prestige, not what he learns
It’s the number of digits in the figure he earns
Then it’s four years of anger and dull torment
He feels like he’s caged, he’s got nowhere to vent
He dreams about literature and classical history
Mysticism, art, approaching the mystery
Of existence so deep and impenetrable
But finds himself ostracized, ineligible
To participate in anything meaningful and deep
He’s wasting his life, drifting half-asleep
He reads interviews, biographies, of people he admires
And in his deeprest most secret heart he conspires
To create something beautiful and noble and great
To overcome his circumstances, transform the hate
He feels growing in his heart, a cold burning
Apathy replacing the old hungry yearning
Next thing you know, it’s been four long years
He’s fought with his friends, loves drinking that beer
Somehow he graduates, seemingly whole
Finds a job but feels like he’s losing his soul
While Peter’s home, worryin’, wishin’
He thinks that his son is devoid of ambition
All the hopes, all the dreams dad invested within him
Have crystallized into a cold wedge between them
He can’t seem to say in words what he’s feelin’
As he watches his child grow more and more distant
His son feels relief when he walks out the door
He’s glad they don’t really talk anymore
Well that’s not quite true ’cause they never really did
Not beyond homework and what he got on that quiz
They go through perfunctory motions, it’s true
But there’s nothing beyond that they think they can do
They can’t relate or express what they feel
And they’re both certain they’ll never talk for real.
To love out of duty and not out of joy
Is that love at all, for Peter and his boy?
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