Paradise

[Verse 1]

When I was a child my family would travel

Back to Western Kentucky where my parents were born

To a backward old town that I often remembered

So many times that my memories are worn

[Verse 2]

Then sometimes we'd travel on down the Green River

To the abandoned old prison down by Adrian's Hill

Where the air smelled like snakes and we'd shoot with our pistols

But empty pop bottles was all we would kill

[Chorus]

Daddy won't you take me back to Muhlenberg County

Down by the green river where paradise lay?

I'm sorry, my son, but you're too late in asking

Mister Peabody's coal train done hauled it away

[Verse 3]

Well, the coal companies came with the world's largest shovel

They tortured the timber and stripped all the land

They dug for the coal till the land was forsaken

Then wrote it all down to the progress of man

[Chorus]

Oh, daddy won't you take me back to Muhlenberg County

Down by the green river where paradise lay?

I'm sorry, my son, but you're too late in asking

Mister Peabody's coal train done hauled it away

[Verse 4]

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

Five miles away from wherever I am

[Chorus]

Oh, daddy won't you take me back to Muhlenberg County

Down by the green river where paradise lay?

I'm sorry, my son, but you're too late in asking

Mister Peabody's coal train done hauled it away

[Outro]

I'm sorry, my son, but you're too late in asking

Mister Peabody's coal train hauled it away