In My Son's Eyes

In My Son's Eyes

by Steve Tieri

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED (3/13/2000)

...In his eyes, I see things.

They're shaped like mine

And they look right back at me.

He's just got this look...

Like I know him from somewhere...

He tells me garbled stories

And I laugh.

I think of the journey down the winding branches that Many men took for he and I to be here...

It makes me sad that I never got to know most of them...

Sometimes I feel very lost in that way.

When I look into my son's eyes I feel like I'm learning something new, something I could never know until now.

He helps me understand where I come from and who I am.

I am anxious to learn more about him, who he exactly is...

Yet, I don't want to rush the process, enough has been lost over time.

When that little four-month-old laugh tickles me right back, I can only describe it as the most euphoric feeling in the world.

The kind of laugh that you would give anything up for...

The kind of laugh you yearn for.

And when he locks on smiling and staring right into my eyes...

I stare back with many new emotions, feelings I could only learn from being a father. I still can't believe I'm someone's

"father."

I want to be the same man to him that my father is to me.

And when I look into his eyes,

I promise to us both that I will try as hard as I can.