THE FATHER OF A BOY NAMED SUE
(Written by Shel Silverstein)


Intro by Shel Silverstein
OK, now, years ago, I wrote a song called "A Boy Named Sue", And, 
that was OK and everything except, then I started to think about it, 
and I thought, It is unfair. I am, I am looking at the whole thing 
from the poor kid's point of view. And as I get more older and more 
fatherly, I begin to look at things from old men's point of view. 
So, I decided to give the old man equal time. OK, here we go... 

Yeah, I left home when the kid was three
And it sure felt good to be fancy free
Though I knew it wasn't quite the the fatherly thing to do
But that kid kept screaming and throwing up
And pissing in his pants till I had enough
So just for revenge I went and named him Sue
Yeah! 

It was Gatlinburg in mid July
I was gettin drunk but gettin by
Gettin old and going from bad to worse 

When through the door with an awful scream
Comes the ugliest queen I've ever seen
He says, "My name is Sue, how do you do?"
Then he hits me with his purse 

Now this ain't the way he tells the tell
But he scratched my face with his fingernails
And Then he bit my thumb
And kicked me with his high heel shoe 

So I hit him in the nose and he started to cry
And he threw some perfume in my eye
And it sure ain't easy fightin an old boy named Sue 

So I hit him in the head with a cane back chair
And he screamed, "Hey dad, you mussed my hair!"
And he hit me in the navel and knocked out a piece of my lint 

He was spittin blood, I was spittin teeth
And we crashed through the wall and out into the street
Kickin and gouging in the mud and the blood and the creme de menthe 

Then out of his garter he pulls a gun
I'm about to get shot by my very own son
He's screaming about Sigmund Freud and looking grim - woo
So I though fast and I told him some stuff
How I named him Sue just to make him tough
And I guess he bought it cause now I'm living with him 

Yea he cooks and sews and cleans up the place
He cuts my hair and shaves my face
And irons my shirts better than a daughter could do
And on the nights that I can't score
Well, I can't tell you any more
But it sure is a joy to have a boy named Sue
Yeah a son is fun but it's a joy to have a boy named Sue! 



(Contributed by Shay Griffiths - April 2002)