MUCH MORE THAN A SONG!

By Edwin Cooney

Last Tuesday, December 8th, 2009, marked the 29th anniversary of one of the more tragic events in American history. At approximately 10:50 p.m. EST, twenty-five-year-old Mark David Chapman put four .38 caliber hollow point bullets into the back of John Lennon as Lennon and Yoko Ono entered the 72nd Street entrance of the Dakota, their New York City home.

The deed possessed the magnitude of a presidential assassin’s mission. It tore the hearts and rent the souls of millions of people all over the world.

In less than a half hour following the shooting, thousands of people amassed in front of the Dakota as well as outside of St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center where Dr. Stephan Lynn pronounced John Lennon dead at 11:15 p.m.

“All we are saying,” They tearfully sang, “is Give Peace a Chance.”

Next they would sing “Imagine,” the title song of John Lennon’s September 1971 solo album release.

To imagine is to create a mental image of something beyond one’s normal capacity to grasp. To imagine is to create, believe in and sustain, beyond all logic, a concept or cause that can’t possibly be measured. Thus, John Lennon invited you and me to:

Imagine there's no Heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace

You may say that I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world

You may say that I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one.

As I, last Tuesday, listened once again to those immortal words, I felt compelled to decide for myself what the power of that song really was.

Since no one can measure the depth of one’s capacity to imagine, I decided at the outset that John Lennon’s suggestion that we “imagine” is an invitation. Invitations are ultimately far more powerful than commands. Commands can only be issued for measurable outcomes. An invitation is reserved for powerful opportunities such as the commitment to a humane cause or love for a person.

To imagine there’s no heaven or hell and that all the people might live for today, is, it seems to me, an invitation to advocate for grace and goodness, but without the expectation of an ultimate reward.

To imagine that there are no countries, nothing to live or die for, no religion and that all the people may live life in peace, is an invitation to sweep aside the significance of personal limits, politics and international borders.

To imagine that there are no possessions, no greed or hunger, would by itself bring about “the brotherhood of man.” Hence, all of the people sharing all of the world would assure all of us would live as one.

It’s tempting, as one listens, to decide that nothing about the song is real. After all the song contains three glaring ironies; first, John Lennon--one of the richest men on earth--invites you and me to imagine that there are no possessions; second--as perhaps leader of the “British invasion” of the rich American record market, he bids us to “…imagine there’s no countries” asserting that “…it isn’t hard to do.”

Finally, comes the greatest irony of all. John Lennon, if not an atheist, certainly an agnostic, invites us to imagine “…no religion.” Yet, as “Imagine” reaches its climax, one realizes that this man of music, poetry, and intellect has just brought forth much more than a mere song. To comprehend the possibility of a world without war, without the need for possessions, greed, and hunger is a world not of a dreamer, but rather, a definition of Heaven on earth.

As the music stops and silence prevails, the source of its power hits you with full force. “Imagine” by John Lennon is much more than an invitation, poem or song.
Perhaps he didn’t realize or even intend it back in the days dominated by his passion for art, music, poetry, political activism and Yoko Ono when he composed it, but John Lennon’s “Imagine” is ultimately a prayer.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY