Yes, I was there when it happened;
The day he died.
I was always there, he depended on me,
And I didn’t ever fail him; did I?
This man chosen by The Bird to play in his band;
Dizzy wanted him, and bebop rang out,
Loud and long, until that day
When he was joined with Gerry,
And the Quartet struck gold.
And that is when I joined him, this man
Who could play like a nightingale,
And sing like an angel.
All the time I was there, supporting this man,
Never left him, followed him all over the world.
He played those gentle tunes that we know
With a sound so mellow, that the birds stopped to listen.
That day when he went looking for me,
The saddest of all, beaten to a pulp;
No longer able to play for months but he found me,
I wasn’t far away that day but not close enough
To protect him.
But he came back and the music swelled again
From this genius of Jazz.
Then came that day in Amsterdam;
Just the two of us in the hotel room.
I as ever supporting him
As he injected me into his arm.
He got up and stumbled, and as he fell from the window,
I was still there, when his eyes closed forever.