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The Old Paul Jones

from The Petals by Al Grierson

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lyrics

THE OLD PAUL JONES

Gentle voices calling out to lovers just to lead em where their hearts belong
So they come persuadin to the poet just to tangle up his life in song
It’s kinda like the calling of the highway and the answers in the gypsy’s bones
Kinda like the calling of the river to the pilot on the Old Paul Jones

There’s some that say you’re crazy with a bucket full of stars
You’d be better selling buggywhips to motorbikes and cars
Though you’re trading in a wagon full of 20 buck cigars
for the smoke behind the Old Paul Jones

Birth and death, another load of laundry
and the stuff that comes along between
Life’s a way of filling up the hours when there’s nothing on the TV screen
Look alive, along the straight and narrow
keep your eye upon the big red ball
Pick yer stone, but save it for the sparrow
and be certain that you see it in fall

And the questions come as quiet as a whisper to the wise
There's a hush along the levee, the river starts to rise
They watch your disappearance with their disbelievin eyes
Through the smoke behind the Old Paul Jones

Leave em all to a pocket full of watches
and another full of deadman’s gold
But their souls get wrinkled up and full of ice
only when their hearts get old
Leave em til their ossified opinions like nothing let the whole thing go
Spend your day just dancing with the angels
Strumming Dixie on the old banjo

And you never say you’re sorry that it’s gone away too soon
In a dizzy misty history, a sour mash of tunes
Cause you always left it hanging like an old Missouri moon
Through the smoke behind the Old Paul Jones

Comes a time to shuffle off to glory
Comes a time to lay your burden down
You’ll be there still sniffin on the roses
When they lay you in the cold cold ground
Laughing through the awful lamentations for a life so full of misspent years
Singing through the smoke behind the (steamboat) on a river full of mispilled tears

Or he coulda been a cowboy or a railroad engineer
He coulda even been a banker or some other odd career
But we lost him to the music and the words that disappear
In the smoke behind the Old Paul Jones

And the questions come as quiet as a whisper to the wise
There’s a hush along the levee and the river starts to rise
As they watch you disappearin with their disbelievin eyes
Through the smoke behind the Old Paul Jones

credits

from The Petals, released June 10, 2021

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