Never a perfect gentleman,
He wore his anger on his sleeve…
Yet he left his heartfelt feelings
In tender lyrics he’d conceive.
Famous for writing country songs…
He left his personal apologies
While voicing all his hopes and dreams,
In numerous discographies.
I was never a fan of country,
I gave the genre no Grammy votes…
That was until I heard Merle Haggard,
Sing his trademark lower notes…
Most writers stayed on neutral ground,
Concerned more with the rhyme and beat.
Yet Merle, shared his ups and downs,
Writing from both sides of the street.
A legendary asshole
In his houseboat on Shasta Lake…
He harbored encyclopedic emotions
Of painful memories keeping him awake.
Facebook offers useless surveys,
Like selling mental dental floss…
“What singer’s death hurt you the most”?
Merle Haggard was my biggest loss.
My friends would never guess this,
They’d say Joni Mitchell or Leonard Cohen.
Yet having never heard Haggard’s low notes,
There’s no way they would have known.
