I Pray Your Soul to Keep

I was grieving the loss of my father when I wrote this. Our relationship had be tenuous at best most of the time, but in his later years he met Louise and she was instrumental in taming his dependence on alcohol. They were both daily drinkers but Louise taught him how to "maintain" and "restrict" his drinking so that he didn't lose control, he was a mean drunk otherwise. Anyway I started on the song and realized that there was still a lot of love there for the man he had been, my dad who kept the "monsters" away.

I Pray Your Soul to Keep - Douglas W. Fielder

There was a time, when I knew for sure.
There was a place, it was mine and it was yours.
You alway remember the great times in your life those memories just stay.
As clear as the day that they happened, they never really fade away.

Guess there’s nothing to be said bout growing older now.
Always thought that there would be so many years ahead somehow.
Always dreamed that you would hold your great-grandkids on your knee
Always dreamed that you would tell them stories they would not believe.

Who really knew, knew the soul deep inside.
There are so few who knew the love, knew that side.
I remember I was small and the monsters on the wall filled me full of all I feared.
You would come and hold me tight, sometimes deep into the night until the monsters disappeared.

There are so many things about the love you shared with us all
Now you’re gone and all those monsters reappear upon the wall.
I just know that you are resting with the angels up above.
And I know that you are using them to send us down your love.

Well there it is, there is nothing left to say
I’ll think of you many times along the way
My memories of all that we shared will always help me to be strong
I’m a better man inside because you always tried to teach me right from wrong

Now my prayer is simple as we come to lay you down to sleep
I look to the Lord above and I pray for your soul to keep.
He’s listening, I know and now you’ll never be alone.
He’s got you in his arms and he has come to take you home.