| Am | C | G | |
| Lather was | thirty years | old today, |
| Em | D | C | |
| They | took away | all of his | toys. |
| Am | C | G | |
| His | mother sent | newspaper | clippings to him, |
| Em | D | C | |
| About his | old friends who'd | stopped being | boys. |
| Em | D | F | D | |
| There was | Harwitz E. | Green, just | turned thirty- | three, |
| Am | Em | D | |
| His | leather chair | waits at the | bank. |
| Em | D | F | D | |
| And | Seargent Dow | Jones, twenty- | seven years | old, |
| Am | Em | D | |
| Commanding his | very own | tank. |
| C | D | Em | |
| But | Lather still | finds it a | nice thing to do, |
| C | D | Em | |
| To | lie about | nude in the | sand, |
| C | D | Em | |
| Drawing | pictures of | mountains that | look like bumps, |
| D | Am | A | |
| And | thrashing the air with his | hands. |
| A | G | |
| But | wait, oh Lather's | productive you know, |
| A | G | A | |
| He | produces the | finest of | sound, |
| G | |
| Putting drumsticks on either | side of his nose, |
| A | G | A | |
| Snorting the | best licks in | town .....Am G D |
| E | |
| But | that's all over... |
| Am | C | G | |
| Lather was | thirty years | old today, |
| Em | D | C | |
| And | Lather came | foam from his | tongue. |
| Am | C | G | |
| He | looked at me | eyes wide and | plainly said, |
| Em | D | C | |
| Is it | true that I'm | no longer | young? |
| Em | D | F | D | |
| And the | children | call him | fam | ous, |
| Am | Em | D | |
| What the | old men | call in | sane, |
| Em | D | F | D | |
| And | some | times he's so | name | less, |
| Am | Em | D | |
| That he | hardly | knows which | game to play... |
| C | |
| Which | words to say... |
| C | D | Em | |
| And I | should have | told him, | "No, you're not old." |
| C | D | Em | D | Am | |
| And I | should have | let him go | on... | smiling...baby | wide. |