John Prine

"I wish you love - and happiness I guess I wish - you all the best I wish you don't - do like I do And never fall in love with someone like you Cause if you fell - just like I did You'd probably walk around the block like a little kid But kids don't know - they can only guess..."

"Kiss a little baby Give the world a smile If you take an inch Give 'em back a mile Cause if you lie like a rug And you don't give a damn You're never gonna be As happy as a clam So I'm sitting in a hotel Trying to write a song My head is just as empty As the day is long."

"I can see the fire burning Burning right behind your eyes I can see the fire burning, baby Burning right behind your eyes You must've swallowed a candle Or some other kind of surprise."

"It's a measure of treasure that gives me the pleasure Of loving you the way I do And you know I would gladly say I need your love badly And bring these little things to you. Cause you got gold Gold inside of you You got gold Gold inside of you Well I got some Gold inside me too"

"Why just before last Christmas My baby went away And I find it real surprising For myself to hear me say That everything is cool Everything's okay"

"Oh my God, what have I gotten myself into? I'm a human corkscrew and all my wine is blood They're gonna kill me Mama. They don't like me Bud. So Jesus went to Heaven and he went there awful quick All them people killed him and he wasn't even sick So come and gather around me my contemporary peers And I'll tell you all the story of Jesus, the missing years"

"Ya' know that old trees just grow stronger And old rivers grow wilder every day Old people just grow lonesome Waiting for someone to say, "Hello in there, hello"... So if you're walking down the street sometime And spot some hollow ancient eyes Please don't just pass 'em by and stare As if you didn't care, say, "Hello in there, hello""

"Sam Stone came home To the wife and family After serving in the conflict overseas. And the time that he served, Had shattered all his nerves, And left a little shrapnel in his knees. But the morphine eased the pain, And the grass grew round his brain, And gave him all the confidence he lacked, With a purple heart and a monkey on his back. There's a hole in daddy's arm where all the money goes, Jesus Christ died for nothin I suppose, Little pitchers have big ears, Don't stop and count the years, Sweet songs never last too long on broken radios."

"Well, sometimes we'd travel right down the Green River To the abandoned old prison down by Airdrie Hill Where the air smelled like snakes and we'd shoot with our pistols But empty pop bottles was all we would kill. Then the coal company came with the world's largest shovel And they tortured the timber and stripped all the land Well, they dug for their coal till the land was forsaken Then they wrote it all down as the progress of man."

"I know a man who's got a lot to lose A pretty nice fella, kinda confused Got muscles in his head that've never been used He thinks he owns half of this town He goes out drinkin' gets a big red nose Beats his old lady with a rubber hose Then he takes her out to dinner Buys her new clothes That's the way that the world goes 'round You're up one day, the next you're down It's a half-an-inch of water and you think you're gonna drown That's the way that the world goes 'round"

"Many years later I found myself talking to this girl Who was standing there with her back turned to Lake Marie The wind was blowing especially through her hair ...Many years later we found ourselves in Canada Trying to save our marriage and perhaps catch a few fish Whatever seemed easier, that night she fell asleep in my arms Humming the tune to, "Louie Louie" Aah baby, we gotta go now"

"We were standing, Standing by peaceful waters Standing by peaceful waters Whoa, wah, oh wha, oh Whoa, wah, oh wha, oh"

"And the old men sit round the cracker barrels The children hum their Christmas carols The train tracks all run parallel But they'll all meet up one day"

"On a dusty pew in a vestibule Sits the Devil playing pocket pool He's waiting for the next poor fool Who forgot that it was Sunday"

"We are the lonely all together All together we're all alone We are the lonely all together All together we're all alone"

"The cashier at the pump & pay Knows everything's gonna be okay The all night all right rent-a-cop Is across the street at the donut shop The waitress waits with whiskey sour At the single mingle happy hour The one man band begins to sing Accompanied by a drum machine"

"I am an old woman named after my mother My old man is another child that's grown old If dreams were lightning thunder was desire This old house would have burnt down a long time ago Make me an angel that flies from Montgom'ry Make me a poster of an old rodeo Just give me one thing that I can hold on to To believe in this living is just a hard way to go When I was a young girl well, I had me a cowboy He weren't much to look at, just free rambling man But that was a long time and no matter how I try The years just flow by like a broken down dam."

"God bless this kitchen said the knick-knack chef The dinner's almost ready Go and wash yourself Jimmy's growing up now and Wanda's growing old The time is growin' shorter the nights are long and cold C'mon, baby, spend the night with me. Sneaking in the closet and through the diary Now, don't you know all he saw was all there was to see The whole town saw Jimmy on the six o'clock news His brains were on the sidewalk and blood was on his shoes"

"Caught a train from Alexandria Just a broken man in flight Running scared with his devils Saying prayers all through the night Oh but mercy can't find him Not in the shadows where he calls Forsaking all his better angels That's how every empire falls"

"Padlock the door and board the windows Put the people in the street "It's just my job," he says "I'm sorry." And draws a check, goes home to eat But at night he tells his woman "I know I hide behind the laws." She says, "You're only taking orders." That's how every empire falls."

"A bitter wind blows through the country A hard rain falls on the sea If terror comes without a warning There must be something we don't see What fire begets this fire? Like torches thrown into the straw If no one asks, then no one answers That's how every empire falls."

"We made love In every way love can be made And we made time Look like time Could never fade Friday Night We both made the guitars hum Saturday made Sunday feel Like it would never come Gonna be a long Monday Sittin' all alone on a mountain By a river that has no end"

"There's a girl in the white house I don't even know her name Her disheveled appearance Speaks volumes of shame It's an embarrassing situation But a situation just the same The way she walks on others And never takes the blame Upsets my constitution Beyond its mortal frame."

"Some humans ain't human Some people ain't kind You open up their hearts And here's what you'll find A few frozen pizzas Some ice cubes with hair A broken Popsicle You don't want to go there..."

"You're feeling your freedom And the world's off your back Some cowboy from Texas Starts his own war in Iraq]] Some humans ain't human Some people ain't kind"

"The dark and distant drumming The pounding of the hooves The silence of everything that moves Late at night you'll see them decked out in shiny jewels the coming of the caravan of fools"

"Love and devotion, deep as any ocean don't play by anybody's rules With your carousel of horses and your unforeseen forces, you're running with the caravan of fools Caravan of fools, caravan of fools You're running with the caravan of fools"

"I woke up this morning to a garbage truck Looks like this ol' horseshoe's done run out of luck If I came home, would you let me in? Fry me some pork chops and forgive my sin?"

"Surround me with your boundless love Confound me with your boundless love I was drowning in the sea, Lost as I could be When you found me With your boundless love"

"Sometimes my old heart is like a washing machine It bounces around 'til my Soul comes clean And when I'm clean and hung out to dry I'm gonna make you laugh until you cry"

"If by chance I should find myself at risk of falling from this jagged cliff I look below, and I look above I'm surrounded by your boundless love"

"Summer's end's around the bend just flyin' The swimmin' suits are on the line just dryin' I'll meet you there for our conversation I hope I didn't ruin your whole vacationWell you never know how far from home you're feelin' Until you've watched the shadows cross the ceilin' Well I don't know, but I can see it snowin' In your car the windows are wide open"

"When I get to heaven, I'm gonna shake God's hand Thank him for more blessings than one man can stand Then I'm gonna get a guitar and start a rock-n-roll band Check into a swell hotel, ain't the afterlife grand?"

"I've been down this road before I remember every tree Every single blade of grass Holds a special place for me And I remember every town And every hotel room Every song I ever sang On a guitar out of tune"

"I remember everything Things I can't forget The way you turned and smiled on me On the night that we first met And I remember every night Your ocean eyes of blue How I miss you in the morning light Like roses miss the dew"