Single Father Poem by Loretta Doyle Smalley

It started as a game, a simple joke.
A one night stand with someone I really don't know.
Not even a month later she showed up at my door.
She tells me that I am going to be a father.
I didn't even know what to say.
I was speechless.
I just fell to my knees.
Asking myself if the baby was even mine.
I mean I used protection and she said that she was on birthcontrol.
I don't know how this could have happen.
I am only 16.
Can I really be a father?
I won't turn my back on her or my baby.
She said that she doesn't want it.
I started to yell before she could finish.
I yelledd well you sure are not killing my baby.
I want a DNA Test done.
If that baby is mine I will be a man and take care of my responsibility.
She said that she will have the test done.
She will have the baby and turn all of her rights over.
She is not ready to be a mother.
She kept calling the baby a it.
A baby is not a it, a baby is a special gift from God.
I didn't want a baby like this.
Women are not the only ones with dreams about fairy tales.

I paid for all the doctor bills.
The DNA Test showed that I was the father.
I kept my word and did what I said that I would do.
I was there when my baby boy was born.
I never knew that you could love someone that you just met.

I knew what I had to do and I was going to do it.
I had to be the best father that I could be.
Ii regret having sex with someone that I really don't know, but I don't regret being a father to my son.
Even if I am 16 and have to do it alone.
I am a single father.