The Pale Horse And His Rider

8 And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth.
9 And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held:
10 And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?
11 And white robes were given unto every one of them; and it was said unto them, that they should rest yet for a little season, until their fellowservants also and their brethren, that should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled.
12 And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood;
13 And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind.
14 And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.
15 And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains;
16 And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb:
17 For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?




Back in ol’ Army Texas A&M there was a greasy spoon restaurant at Northgate that I only went to a couple of times ever. The first time there a B side on the jukebox caught my eye. From the Bible. I played it and it literally put the fear of God in me. I thought I was above all that nonsense. I’m listening to it decades later now. Sung this time by Rattlesnake Annie. I bought her tape because I had heard of her, but mostly for this song.

It’s in three-four time like a waltz, but! It pounds. It’s perfect. Annie does it great, but when the author and his wife Audrey sang it in hillbilly harmony, I wanted to kneel right there naked before God and beg for mercy. You could picture it, feel it, the very breath of hellfire down your neck. Sort of like when I saw Walt Disney put in animation the song Ghost Riders In The Sky.

Why does the apocalypse scare so badly? What is its appeal? Just this side of us that likes a good fright from a ghost story?

I had a Country Band in Switzerland and was hired once to promote a new Swiss Watch. This Catholic girl heard us and invited me to church with her when she heard me sing I Saw The Light. She thought I might put a little fire into Catholic Mass.

I ordered the sheet music for it, but remembered this song also and ordered sheet music for it too. The Catholic Church there in Bern didn’t know what hit them.



The Pale Horse And His Rider

Listen poor sinner
You’re drifting away
From the dear Savior
Who’s pleading today
What will you do
With the Savior at night
When the pale horse
And his rider pass by.

The time now ain’t long
When the Savior will come
Then you’ll be judged
By the deeds you have done
On that judgment day
You’ll weep and you’ll cry
When the pale horse
And his rider pass by.

When that trumpet sounds
On the sinners below
Not even the angels
In heaven will know
That’s when you’ll wish
You had Jesus nigh
When the pale horse
And his rider pass by.

Won’t you redeem
Your poor wicked soul
For you can’t pay your way
With silver and gold
If you’re not saved
You’ll be lost to the night
When the pale horse
And his rider pass by.


By Hank Williams

Nazis

I finished reading this weekend a book about the rivalry between the University of Texas and Texas A&M. To be fair to the book and to UT, it did mention in the middle of the book how a guy hated the Aggies on the football field, but admired their patriotism and the lives sacrificed by them for their country.

But the book ended with the game of 2001, which would be the Thanksgiving Friday after the 911 tragedy. The book raved over the Aggie-Oklahoma State game where the Aggie student body and alumni filled the entire Kyle Field, home of the Aggies, with the lower deck in blue, the middle in white, and the upper in red, from fans wearing t-shirts of those colors.

But back to the end of the book. The author was standing, at Aggie games you stand, next to a long haired, necklace wearing UT student. The Aggies call such teasippers, but this variety still looks like a left over hippie. At the half time this hippie frieked out when he saw the Aggie band march onto the field. The whole Aggie world frieks out too at such times, but in total awe of their performance. This hippie could not believe how after all these years so many Nazis still attended Texas A&M. The rest of the afternoon for him was about Nazi Aggies this and Nazi Aggies that, after zeroing in on the two thousand cadets in the stands, not to mention Parson's Mounted Cavalry, and if he only knew, probably thirty thousand easy, ex-cadets all around him.

I'll tell you what's amazing. Is anachronims like this guy still exist, even at t.u. Aggies have moved on. They don't fight the Vietnam war anymore. They're in Iraq now. Again actually. They're also the future of this country. The new trend even. They're not Nazis at all and actually they weren't during Vietnam. They serve. They give the ultimate. And yes they're still here. They never left. And they're the only reason this anachronym was still around. Nobody else would fight to keep him safe or give him the room to be an idiot.

He hasn't kept up. He didn't notice probably that even in Vietnam, these Aggies and their fellow servicemen, won every major land battle in that war, a war this guy thinks we lost, because we did lose it. And not because of Aggies, but because of guys like him, that think we lost probably every major land battle and that we lost them in Iraq too somehow, and because of Bush we're still losing them. And because of Aggies we're going to keep losing them.

He probably reads the paper and is so proud he can read and is sure Aggies can't. Why else would their be Aggie jokes. But I'll quote John Lennon. He might can read the Austin American-Statesman and the New York Times, but like those newspapers, he doesn't know that he's out and Aggies are in. Like John Lennon's quote, he might can read, but he didn't notice that the lights had changed.

The Lost Art of the Tear Jerker

There is the saying, actually a song by Barbara Mandrell about, I was Country before Country was cool. But she didn't sing it Country.

I remember back in the Seventies talking with my Aunt Wanette about Patsy Cline and Tammy Wynette, how just so fabulous they were, like best ever mode for female Country singers, if not Country singers period. That was before all the hoopla about them that is so legendary now it's as if everyone always knew.

I was listening just now to Patsy Cline again. Hank Williams, in particular, was famous for tear jerkers. But there were so many in Country music at one time. And listening to Patsy Cline again now reminds how she could just hurt you so thoroughly with her feeling. Hank didn't just write sad songs, he wrote tormented songs. Like how could you still be alive and sing this, and he wasn't much longer. But Patsy let you live. It was a hurt as pure as water, you almost wanted to thank her for the total complete love she shared with that hurt.

The saddest of hers, right up there with some of Hank's, Lonely Street. It numbs you it is so beautiful and hurting at the same time. The tears are there, but they crystalize or something and don't come out.

But the one I'm listening to right now, over and over, it was written by Little Jimmy Dickens. You don't think of him with tear jerkers, but he wrote a piercing one, When You're House Is Not A Home. The way Patsy sings it, you are paralyzed with emotion. It's almost glorious. A lost art. I hate that it's lost. The world seems so shallow without them. Not happy now that they're gone. That's not what people are, it's just shallow now with them gone.

I was in Switzerland once mesmerized while sitting in a chair listening to Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata. This girl made a snide comment to me for listening to such a sad song. Like there is something wrong with me. Even with beauty being in the eye of the beholder, I'll tell you flat. There was nothing wrong with me and everything wrong with her and that was just a symptom.

There is nothing more excruciating, as impossible, as a lost love, with the broken hearts, the self-doubts, the lack of meaning that is suddenly thrust upon you. If you could hear Patsy sing Little Jimmy Dickens' words. You would share gladly the most endearing and marvelous pain any soul could withstand. It is now a lost art and seems hidden in the remnants of a lost, glorious, deep and in tune civilization.

I walk up to my door
And hate to turn the key
Emptiness is all that waits inside for me
That's how it is
When the one you love is gone
That's how it is
When you're house is not a home.

I look around and see things marked
With his and hers
Little things like this
Just make things that much worse
That's how it is
Since I live my life alone
That's how it is
When your house is not a home.

Is there a way out
For a soul so torn as mine
Each day I live
Is like a prisoner passing time
That's how it is
Just ask anyone who lives alone
That's how it is
When your house is not a home.

Shakespeare was so tame in comparison, when talking about how it is better to have loved and lost than . . . .

To have lived that, to have seen Hank and Patsy having lived that. I felt special in my pain. I felt Godly in my pain. Only love could produce such beautiful, wholesome pain. How can one feel alive without the fullness of so much love and the pain that is it's symmetry?

When I heard Hank sing, more like cry out from the dark, I was not afraid to feel the words he sang that I could only feel, but not express. I wasn't alone. The most beautiful hurt I've ever felt was with him.

Like a bird
That's lost his mate in flight
I'm alone
And oh so blue tonight
Like a piece of driftwood on the sea
May you never be alone like me.

In the Bible
God's own words do say
Forever on someday you'll pay
I pray the Lord to set me free
May you never be alone like me.


When my oldest was two years old I had a Country band in Switzerland. I remembered how my Dad used to sing Gospel songs to me when I was a boy. I pulled out my guitar and sang to my son a goodnight, but chose one of my favorite Gospel songs that my father used to sing.

In my father's house are many mansions
If it were not true he would have told me so
He has gone away to live
In that bright city
He's preparing me a mansion there I know.

Jesus died upon the cross
To bear my sorrow
Truly died that souls like you
Might have new life
But I know that soon there'll come
That bright tomorrow
When the world will all be free
From sin and strife.

He began to cry and I had to stop singing and his mother scolded me. I didn't really want to make my son cry, but I was almost glad I had. I wanted him to know. To know it. This. God put it there. I knew something in me knew God, and now my son did too.