Paradise

When I was a boy, my family would travel

Down to western Kentucky where my parents were born

To a lost little town there that’s all but remembered

So many times that my memories are worn.

And, “Daddy, won’t you take me back to Muhlenberg County?

Down by the Green River where Paradise lay?”

He said, “I’m sorry my son, but you’re too late in asking

Mr. Peabody’s coal train has hauled it away.”

Well, sometimes we’d travel right down the Green River

To the abandoned old prison down by Aidrie Hill

Where the air smelled like snakes & we’d shoot our pistols

Ooh, but empty pop bottles is all we would kill.

And, “Daddy, won’t you take me back to Muhlenberg County?

Down by the Green River where Paradise lay?”

He said, “I’m sorry my son, but you’re too late in asking

Mr. Peabody’s coal train has hauled it away.”

Well, the coal company came with the, world’s largest shovel,

They tortured the timber and stripped all the land

Lord, they dug for their coal ‘til the ground was forsaken

And wrote it all down as the, “Progress of man.”

And, “Daddy, won’t you take me back to Muhlenberg County?

Down by the Green River where Paradise lay?”

He said, “I’m sorry my son, but you’re too late in asking

Mr. Peabody’s coal train has hauled it away.”

When I die, let my ashes float down the Green River

Let my soul roll on up to the Rochester Dam

I’ll be halfway to Heaven with Paradise waitin’

Just 5 miles away from wherever I am...