When Richard Cory came around We looked at him like he was crowned A gentleman so gracious He was quiet, understated And he always bought the beer Although he knew we couldn't pay And he fluttered all the pulses Of the girls lined in his way And his family was wealthy And he aced each of his grades Yeah, he made it look so easy We all wished that we could be him But I lost touch after high school When he got a law degree You might see him back for Christmas He would always wave at me So on we worked and waited Living from our hands to mouth And we heard he bought a condo But no word about a spouse And our kids were all tucked in And we were sleeping in our beds When Richard one calm summer night Put a bullet through his head When Richard one calm summer night Put a bullet through his head When Richard one calm summer night Put a bullet through his head They buried you the day it rained Your funeral felt so strange I don't know who else to blame God I wish you would have stayed When Richard Cory left this world Our lives stopped making sense at all