Subject: Lyr Add: THE ULTIMATE WHIM (Carl Henry)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 15 Feb 11 - 08:43 PM

You can hear this at YouTube. I transcribed it. I don't know why I bothered. Does anybody care about people who escape from Hartford, going upstream on the Connecticut River in a lead-bottomed boat? Built just for this purpose, I suppose.


THE ULTIMATE WHIM
Carl Henry, from the album "Life Savings," Jamboree Records CSS-124 (1976)

We started north in the light-time.
We were a party of five:
Jenny and John and his sister,
Mary with me at her side.

The Congress called it an adventure.
A short one, it lasted five days.
I didn't expect finding Mary
With the others she'd hidden away.

CHORUS: Mary, I love you. John, you too.
Jenny and Maggie, I need both of you.
I only hope there are more who lived through.

The river was hot with its poison,
But we found a lead-bottomed boat,
And deciding to chance leaving Hartford,
We loaded and set out afloat.

Springfield was almost an impasse.
The bridges were down in our way.
We squeezed through an archway of concrete
Formed by the ...

The rest of the trip was accomplished.
We agreed to make camp when it cleared.
'Bout six hours north of Hanover,
We branched off and settled our gear.

CHORUS

Maggie she died 'bout a week after that,
Her arms and her face eaten through.
But the four of us prospered; we got our health back.
Jenny was seven months due.

Then I caught John with Mary alone.
I squared things the following night.
The rain started in so I left him to stink
With his handle adorning my knife.

CHORUS

When I finally found Betty, she'd settled things right.
With a razor she'd sliced her own neck.
Jenny and me the next morning we left
And hiked toward the mountainous west.

That fall Jenny gave me a baby born dead,
And she had to fight to survive,
And although we prayed for a miracle save
She lay with her head paralyzed.

CHORUS

Now twice a day I man a short-wave
And hope for sunlight to arrive.
I feed Jenny meals and I watch her recline
With her boy baby still at her side.

My brother was Abel; my nephew was Cain.
Jesus is my next of kin.
Now I rule the world which is all my domain.
I've conquered my ultimate whim.
I've conquered my ultimate whim.
I've conquered my ultimate whim.