Busted flat in Baton Rouge, headin' for the train,
Feelin' nearly faded as my jeans.
Bobby thumbed a diesel down, just before it rained;
Took us all the way to New Orleans.
I took my harpoon out of my dirty red bandanna,
And was blowing sad while Bobby sang the blues.
With them windshield wipers slappin' time,
And Bobby clappin' hands,
We finally sang up every song that driver knew.
Freedom's just another word for nothing' left to lose:
Nothin' ain't worth nothin' but it's free.
Feeling good was easy, Lord, when Bobby sang the blues.
Feeling good was good enough for me;
Good enough for me and Bobby McGee.
From the coal mines of Kentucky to the California sun,
Bobby shared the secrets of my soul.
Standin' right beside me, Lord, through everything I've done,
Every night she kept me from the cold.
Then somewhere near Salinas, Lord, I let her slip away,
Lookin' for the home I hope she'll find.
And I'd trade all my tomorrows for a single yesterday,
Holdin' Bobby's body next to mine.
Freedom's just another word for nothing' left to lose:
Nothin' left is all she left for me.
Feeling good was easy, Lord, when Bobby sang the blues.
Buddy, that was good enough for me;
Good enough for me and Bobby McGee.
La da da la la na na na
La da da na na.
La la la da, Me and Bobby McGee.
La la la la la da da da
La la la da da.
La la la da, Me and Bobby McGee.
La la la la la na na na
La la la da da.
La da da da, Me and Bobby McGee.
La la la la la da da da..............
It isn't Waste Land, there are no obscure literary or biblical allusions, it isn't written in iambic pentameter using high flown language, but it does what poetry is supposed to do: capture a part of the human experience and express it in a distilled, immediate way. There are lots of songs like this -- McCartney's "Yesterday", Lori Lieberman's "Killing Me Softly", and Bill Withers' "Ain't No Sunshine" come to mind -- that are highly poetic, and that will be being recorded in fifty or a hundred years, which are certainly well known to the same people who will then complain that nobody appreciates poetry these days.
In many ways, the period between about 1920 - 1960 was the worst in history for poetry. Yes, you had Eliot and Pound and Plath and so on; Yeats was still productive in the first half of this period, but poetry was becoming more and more alien to the mainstream of the populace. Poetry like that found in Houseman's Shropshire Lad (published in 1896), which many common people could relate to, disappeared, and was replaced by something like Eliot's Waste Land (1922), which requires an educational foundation held by very few to truly understand. And then came the revolution of rock&roll music, which restored poetry to the masses, where it remains to this day. Poetry isn't just in books or classrooms: poetry is wherever you find it, and today, you can find poetry by turning on your radio.
