Okkervil River The President's Dead
"The President's dead," the radio said
Dear friends, is it not so horrible?
A shock through my heart like a knife right through
bread
The newspaper said "The President's dead."
The sea doesn't dry and the sky isn't split
But friends it just seems so wrong, don't it?
A shout from the crowd and a shot in the head
The President's lying on the tarmac dead
He's lying face down, with those black-dressed agents
Guns drawn, running around and the early obits
Say he was a good man you can't argue with that
Not today you can't not now you can't
In the media tent where they spin and they slant
They just foam at the mouth and they champ at the bit
Those bloodsuckers can wait; tell those vultures "cool
it"
The newscaster said "The President's dead."
And let's imagine the way, let's say thirty years in
How somebody will say, "What were you doing when?"
On a beautiful day I was waking up, and
I was lying in bed with my girlfriend
And the eggs on the plate, and the bacon hissing
And the coffee was great; there was spring on the wind
If you ever lived through a day where the littlest
things
In the littlest ways, made you feel you were blessed?
And if you died right then, well, you know you'd be
missed
But there's no better state to cease to exist
And you wouldn't feel sad, and you wouldn't resist
Cause you knew what you'd had and were thankful for it
In your own little way, I'm a small quiet man
I've got no wars to win; I don't have a big plan
But I love my new place, and I love my old friends
And I scrimp and I save, and one day I'll have kids
I can truthfully say that my day was like that
Til the radio playing on the stand by the bed
Fired out this report and in three words they said
Like three shots to my head "The President's dead." oh
The President's dead
The President's dead, the President's dead, (the
President's dead)
Oh the President's dead, the President's dead (the
President's dead)
