Dear Mrs. (Cash Johnny)

Dear Mrs though we've never met I know very much about you I know that you've got hair that shines like the morning sun You've got eyes that hold the blueness of the sky And of the deepest sea on a clear day and a smile that has a sparkle of a diamond I know that because I've heard him say those things about you These're the thoughts and the words of a man Who spent many heart breaking years behind prison walls The father of your children the man who worshipped the very ground that you walk on He had a picture of you Mrs it was old and faded and torn But you could tell at a glance that he never exaggerated in his thoughts and visions He never left his cell without first checking to see if he had your picture with him He was a young man when he first came to prison And he talked a great deal about you but as the years passed he talked less and less And during his last year here I don't believe he ever said a word to anybody He had the appearance of a man much older than he really was He walked with his head down and his shoulders saggin' And the walk itself seemed to take a great deal of effort He never received a letter or had a visitor while he was here in prison But never did he stop looking and waitin' Every day at mail call you could see him standing close to his bars With the look of a child awaiting a reward Even after the mailman had passed his cell his pleading eyes would follow beggin' As always he'd feel of his shirt pocket and then just stand there Staring at the emptiness and as always I could Somehow feel the lump in his throat And the burning in his eyes you know Mrs like just before you start to cry Well I thought you might like to know that they buried his body today Just outside the prison walls They buried him there because nobody cared enough to claim his body You know there was even a couple of old convicts there that actually cried No not because they cared for him but for what he died from they cared for Loneliness every prisoner knows loneliness but some know it more than others The man that they buried today had died many times Every day he waited hopin' and prayin' for a letter or a card Or just a note or anything to let him know that somewhere out there Somebody cared for him That assurance never came and today he died Mrs He died from loneliness starved for love a love that nobody ever wanted You see no man woman or child is immune to the need of love or to be loved No matter how terrible his crime might have been The death he died from today was more inhuman But his suffering is over now and he's resting in a pauper's grave in a prison suit And in his pocket is an old torn and faded picture of yes of you Mrs