The end of Marty Robbin’s song El Paso always seemed a little odd to me.
I see the white puff of smoke from the rifle,
I feel the bullet go deep in my chest.
From out of nowhere, Felina has found me,
Kissing my cheek as she kneels by my side.
Cradled by two loving arms that I’ll die for,
One little kiss and Felina good-bye.
*
Are there other songs where a first person narrator describes their own death?
I Hung my Head
And he’d come to fetch me
To see what they’d done
And we’ll ride together
To kingdom come
I prayed for God’s mercy
'Cause soon I’d be dead
I hung my head
I hung my head
In The Long Black Veil the narrator is already dead.
She walks these hills in a long black veil
She visits my grave when the night winds wail
Nobody knows, nobody sees
Nobody knows but me
Terry Jacks- Seasons In The Sun
The Unquiet Grave, perhaps, in one of its many variations.
John Cash–25 Minutes To Go
Ry Cooder’s The Girls From Texas
Bob Dylan’s Romance in Durango.
Bloodrock: DOA
*I remember
We were flying along and hit something in the air *
KISS - Detroit Rock City
Twelve o’clock, I gotta rock
There’s a truck ahead, lights starin’ at my eyes
Oh my God, no time to turn
I got to laugh 'cause I know I’m gonna die
Why
On a lighter note, Shel Silverstein’s “I’m Being Swallowed by a Boa Constrictor”.
And there’s a song I heard once called “Double-Wide Grave”, about a husband who misses his widow, and it’s getting awfully lonely in that grave. But I don’t know who the original artist was, and Google isn’t helping much.
The “Oh God, I’m dead” verse toward the end of Godspell (sung by Jesus).
Powderfinger
It’s not explicit, but I always thought the speaker died at the end of Bruce Springsteen’s “Highway 29.”
Neil Young - Powderfinger
“Raised the rifle to my eye
Never stopped to wonder why
Then I saw black and my face flash in the sky
Shelter me from the powder and the finger
Cover me with the thought that pulled the trigger
Just think of me as one you never figured,
to fade away so young
with so much left undone
Remember me to my love
I know I’ll miss her”
Isaac Lewis by Tom Russell…
“For the waves they swept me overboard with the broken mast and sails
And I drowned, where as a child I’d fished, on the rocks of northern Wales
And in three days time I washed up on the whitened sandy shore
One hundred yards from Moelfre and my father’s white oak door”
Meat Loaf’s Bat out of Hell.