Lyrics to
I Can’t Write Left Handed

This version of I Can’T Write Left Handed was released by Bill Withers in 1973.

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I can’t write left handed
Would you please write a letter to my mother
Tell her to tell the family lawyer
Try to get a deferment for my younger brother

Tell the Reverend Harris to pray for me, lord, lord, lord
I ain’t gonna live, I don’t believe I’m going to live to get much older
Strange little man over here in Vietnam, I ain’t never
Bless his heart I ain’t never done nothin’ to, he done shot me in my shoulder

Boot camp we had classes
You know we talked about fightin’, fightin’ everyday
And lookin’ through rosy, rosy colored glasses
I must admit it seemed exciting anyway
But something that day overlooked to tell me
Bullet look better I must say
Rather when they comin’ at you.
But go without the other way

And please call up the Reverend Harris
And tell him to ask the lord to do some good things for me
Tell him, I ain’t gonna live, I ain’t gonna live, I ain’t gonna live to get much older
Strange little man over here in Vietnam, I ain’t never seen, bless his heart I
ain’t never done nothing to, he done shot me in my shoulder

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Bill Withers has released many songs over the years besides I Can’T Write Left Handed. Bill Withers released songs from 1971 to 1985 spanning across albums like Just As I Am, Still Bill, Live At Carnegie Hall, #NAME?, Making Music, Making Friends, Naked & Warm, Menagerie, 'Bout Love, and Watching You, Watching Me. Decade Lyrics has over lyrics & songs by Bill Withers.

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About Lyrics and I Can’T Write Left Handed by Bill Withers

When you decide to study the lyrics to I Can’T Write Left Handed, you're looking at the words, verses and background chorus from the 1973 song by Bill Withers. Some of the lyrics to I Can’T Write Left Handed have clear meanings and some contain metaphorical references. Like most songs, only Bill Withers and their collaborators know the full story behind any of the their songs.

You can understand the lyrics to I Can’T Write Left Handed if you take apart the structure of the words. The word "lyric" itself derives from the Latin word lyricus, with the actual English word lyrics applied to the definition "words set to music" listed in Stainer and Barrett's 1876 Dictionary of Musical Terms. Continuing the chain, the Latin word lyricus derives from the Greek word λυρικός or lyrikós. This somewhat means "poetry accompanied by the lyre" or "words set to music." You can easily see that by looking at the background of the word lyric, that the "lyrics to I Can’T Write Left Handed" means the words set to the music of I Can’T Write Left Handed, or poetry accompanied by the lyre played by Bill Withers. The singular form "lyric" is still used to mean the complete words to a song. However, the singular form lyric is also commonly used to refer to a specific line (or phrase) within a song's lyrics. Hence, by this analysis of word structure, you could say that the lyric to I Can’T Write Left Handed and the lyrics to I Can’T Write Left Handed are both one and the same thing. None of this talk about the word Lyrics is really relevant to fans of Bill Withers who came here looking just for the lyrics to I Can’T Write Left Handed, but we feel it is still fun to learn what's behind commonly used words and lyrics in songs.

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