Porter Wagoner in a nudie suit
flashes the crowd an embroidered Hi!
He kids around trading jokes with the hee-haw,
then the lights go down and the teardrops start.
The Queens of the Nashville Sound gear up,
nobody’s laughing or chewing now.
Skeeter, frail in a sky blue sheath,
is out of rehab and born again.
Her voice has gone the way of her orchestra.
It’s almost fifty years since the crash
that killed off the harmonising Davis Sisters,
the sleep-overs and double-dates,
square dancing after the Big Barn Frolic.
So long my honey, goodbye my dear,
gonna get along without you now.
When she holds the microphone to her lips
and whispers mine is a lonely life
it sounds like a radio tuned to the end of the world.