Hello, there. Goodbye.

“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?

“And then I’m gonna get a cocktail: vodka and ginger ale.

Yeah, I’m gonna smoke a cigarette that’s nine miles long.

I’m gonna kiss that pretty girl on the tilt-a-whirl, 

’Cause this old man is goin’ to town.”

 

—John Prine (1946-2020), songwriter, “When I Get to Heaven,” 2013.

• Editorial Comment: Heaven’s toe-tappin’ and laughin’ now, John. 

• Hello in There (1971) always makes me teary, performed in NYC in 2001. Video here. 

• Rolling Stone obit: John Prine, one of America’s greatest songwriters, succumbs to complications of coronavirus at 73.

  

PeezPix

Express Flight

  

Check out the April issue of Senior News — “An Unsettling Spring.”

  

    

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“I don’t think writers are sacred, but words are. They deserve respect. If you get the right ones, in the right order, you can nudge the world a little.” —Tom Stoppard