D G D
When I was a child my family would travel
A D
Down to Western Kentucky where my parents were born.
D G D
There's a backwards old town that's often remembered
D A D
So many times that my memories are worn.
D G D
And, Daddy, won't you take me back to Muelenberg County
D A D
Down by the Green River where Paradise lay?
D G D
Well, I'm sorry, my son, but you're too late in asking.
D A D
Mister Peabody's coal train has hauled it away.
Well, sometimes we'd travel right down the Green River
To the abandoned old prison down by Adrie Hill,
Where the air smelled like snakes we'd shoot with our pistols,
But empty pop bottles was all we would kill.
(Chorus)
Then the coal company came with the world's largest shovel
And they tortured the timber and stripped all the land.
They dug for their coal till the land was forsaken
And they wrote it all down as the progress of man.
(Chorus)
When I die, let my ashes float down the Green River,
Let my soul roll on up to the Rochester Dam.
I'll be halfway to Heaven with Paradise waiting,
Just five miles away from wherever I am.
(Chorus)