Lyrics As Poetry

First off; I don't know about you but I find the way most songs are usually written don't stand up very well when read from the written page. Could be just me but I don't think so. So the song I've copied here really rang with me when I heard it recited for the first time about a month ago. I've never heard it performed as a song.

Secondly; this next part has to do with AA but don't go away just yet - the payoff is the song. We'll be there in just a sec. Anyway, in this area, there are a couple of pieces of prose that have been 'adopted' by AA and are routinely read at some group meetings. They are 'The Man In The Glass' (or Gal), and 'Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow' for your information, you uninitiated ones out there. Every once in a while a speaker will close his / her talk by reading something that has been a help to them in sobriety and this song was read at one such meeting recently. This one struck me, as well as a couple of our residents at the time, so I searched it out on-line when we returned from the meeting.

The song is one written by the one and only Hank Williams - the great country swing legend - who died by the bottle on January 1, 1953 at 29 years of age. While I'm not familiar with any of his music I might just have to check it out. (He was a little before my time and I never used to listen to country music.) As always with copyrighted material I'll delete this post upon request from the owners of the material. Without any further ado here is the song: I hope you like it, too.

"Men With Broken Hearts".

You'll meet many just like me upon life's busy street
With shoulders stooped and heads bowed low and eyes that stare in defeat
Or souls that live within the past where sorrow plays all parts
Where a living death is all that's left for men with broken hearts

You have no right to be the judge to criticize and condemn
Just think but for the grace of God it would be you instead of him
One careless step a thoughtless deed and then the misery starts
And to those who weep death comes cheap these men with broken hearts

Oh so humble you should be when they come passing by
For it's written that the greatest men never get too big to cry
Some lose faith in love and life when sorrow shoots her darts
And with hope all gone they walk alone these men with broken hearts

You've never walked in that man's shoes or saw things through his eyes
Or stood and watched with helpless hands while the heart inside you dies
Some were paupers some were kings and some were masters of the arts
But in their shame they're all the same these men with broken hearts

Life sometimes can be so cruel that a heart will pray for death
God why must these living dead know pain with every breath
So help your brother along the road no matter where he starts
For the God that made you made them too these men with broken hearts