John Prine 2: To each his or her own
Hot love, cold love, no love at all
A portrait of guilt is hung on the wall
Nothing is wrong, nothing is right
Donald and Lydia made love that night
Love
In a dusty pew in a vestibule
Sits the devil playing pocket pool
He’s waiting on the next poor fool
Who forgot that it was Sunday
I’m walkin’ down the street like Lucky Leroux
Got my hands in my pockets– thinkin’ about you
I wasn’t hurtin’ nobody
I wasn’t hurtin’ no one
That first lyric, from “Donald and Lydia” concludes
And when it was over there was nothing to say
’cause mostly they made love from ten miles away
But the part that sticks with me after all these years, is the single singsongy line Nothing is wrong. Nothing is right. John’s sort of a philosophical magician that way: he slips the strongest statements in while you’re watching the other hand. (So to speak.)
The devil in the vestibule is the character of the chorus of “He Forgot That It Was Sunday,” from the “Lost Dogs and Mixed Blessings” album. It’s one of several songs on that recording that are lyrically beautiful and painfully obscure at the same time. And “Wasn’t Hurting Nobody” is another of them, albeit in a much less formal– a much less “Sunday”– kind of way. The verses in this one seem to bear little relationship to one another. Well, we eventually figure out that our protagonist is a songwriter in Nashville, Tennessee, contemplating local politics & his early days in Chicago, confusing his frustration with his career with his frustration with his waitress, and, first and last, keeping his hands in his pockets and his mind on the subject of his desire… for the object of his desire.
Perhaps putting too fine a point on it, I’d like to suggest that only a man with his hand in his pockets could have written this, which is a sort of alternate chorus to “He Forgot That It Was Sunday:”
And the old men sit ’round the cracker barrel
The children hum their Christmas Carols
The traintracks all run parallel
But they’ll all meet up one day
Next time: John Prine 3: The Power of Nonsense– unless there are interruptions.