{"id":175368,"date":"2017-12-01T12:47:20","date_gmt":"2017-12-01T17:47:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=175368"},"modified":"2017-12-01T22:13:39","modified_gmt":"2017-12-02T03:13:39","slug":"20-years-after-his-death-john-denvers-life-affirming-lyrics-live-on","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/20-years-after-his-death-john-denvers-life-affirming-lyrics-live-on\/","title":{"rendered":"20 years after his death, John Denver&#8217;s life-affirming lyrics live on"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;\" class=\"sharethis-inline-share-buttons\" ><\/div><p>Last month marked the twentieth anniversary of the death of John Denver. Now, in this Month of All Souls, it is as fitting a time as ever for a retrospective on some of the most salient lines amongst Denver\u2019s popular lyrics of life. While his social advocacy focused on conserving the environment for future generations, his skyrocket to folk stardom was during the time of the 1973 <i>Roe v. Wade<\/i> decision, so it is difficult to hear his songs today apart from the American milieu in which they emerged.<\/p>\n<p>Apparently not a Christian in any orthodox sense of the word (as one might intuit from his film series <i>Oh, God!<\/i>), his love for music was first planted by his Irish Catholic grandmother. As he confided to People magazine in 1977, \u201cWhen I get depressed, I question whether life is worth living.\u201d However, parenthood induced him to conclude, \u201cThe epitome of being a man is being a father.\u201d This ethos bears out in all of his albums, exuding joie de vivre. \u00a0Here are some songs that convey his real zest for life:<\/p>\n<p><b>1. \u201cI Want to Live\u201d<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Denver often prefaced live renditions of one of his most famous pieces, \u201cI Want to Live,\u201d with the somewhat ambiguous motto, \u201cChoose life.\u201d The lyrics of the ballad repeatedly strike a chord that could apply to the vulnerable unborn: \u201cI want to live, I want to grow, I want to see, I want to know, I want to share what I can give, I want to be, I want to live.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/8lFm5tRq5xk\" width=\"640\" height=\"355\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><b>2. \u201cRhymes and Reasons\u201d<\/b><\/p>\n<p>In \u201cRhymes and Reasons,\u201d from his collection, <i>Poems, Prayers, and Promises<\/i>, Denver invokes, \u201cIt is you who cannot accept it is here we must begin to seek the wisdom of the children and the graceful way of flowers in the wind, for the children and the flowers are my sisters and brothers, their laughter and their loveliness would clear a cloudy day, like the music of the mountains and the colors of the rainbow, they\u2019re a promise of the future and the blessing for today\u2026 and the song that I am singing is a prayer to non-believers: \u2018Come and stand beside us, we can find a better way.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This echoes Mother Teresa\u2019s sentiment, \u201cHow can there be too many children? That is like saying there are too many flowers.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/8z49C-YobC8\" width=\"640\" height=\"355\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><b>3. &#8220;Calypso&#8221;<\/b><\/p>\n<p>In \u201cCalypso,\u201d Denver serenades the beauty of life and nature: \u201cTo work in the service of life and the living, in search of the answers to questions unknown,\u00a0to be part of the movement and part of the growing, part of beginning to understand&#8230;\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/vwr2GZv7BwU\" width=\"640\" height=\"355\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><b>4. \u201cFlying for Me\u201d<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Lastly, in \u201cFlying for Me\u201d \u2013 his elegy for the Challenger Space Shuttle disaster \u2013 he opines, \u201cI wanted to go for every man, every child, every mother of children, I wanted to carry the dreams of all people right up to the stars, and I prayed that I\u2019d find an answer there, or maybe I would find a song, giving a voice to all of the hearts that cannot be heard, and for all the ones who live in fear, and all of those who stand apart, my being there would bring us a little step closer together\u2026.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ijlLtVx_PeM\" width=\"640\" height=\"355\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Regardless of whatever John Denver had intended, his soaring songs transcend time and space in their attempt to inspire the listener with a greater love of all life on the planet Earth &#8212; and preborn humans are a part of that life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Last month marked the twentieth anniversary of the death of John Denver. Now, in this Month of All Souls, it is as fitting a time as ever for a retrospective on some of the most salient lines amongst Denver\u2019s popular lyrics of life. While his social advocacy focused on conserving the environment for future generations, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":560,"featured_media":175375,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false},"categories":[7077],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v20.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>20 years after his death, John Denver&#039;s life-affirming lyrics live on<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Regardless of what Denver intended, his songs attempt to inspire listeners with a greater love of all life on Earth. 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