R. I. P., Robert Hunter

Robert Hunter, poet and lyricist for many of the Grateful Dead's most well-known songs, died Sunday evening at the age of 78. 

For the Dead, Garcia and Hunter teamed up for many of the band’s most popular compositions, like “Uncle John’s Band,” “Touch of Grey,” “Casey Jones,” “Friend of the Devil, “Truckin’,” “Franklin’s Tower,” “Eyes of the World,” “Sugaree” and “Scarlet Begonias,” among many others. Hunter also worked with Bob Dylan on multiple songs from the late-’80s onward and more recently has collaborated with songwriters like Bruce Hornsby, Steve Kimock, Jim Lauderdale and David Nelson.

Hunter received the Americana Music Association’s Lifetime Achievement Award in 2013, followed by an induction into the Songwriter’s Hall of Fame (with Garcia) in 2015.

The Relix article does not mention what may be Hunter's most beautiful lyric, to the song, Ripple. I cannot imagine a more fitting
legacy than this:

If my words did glow with the gold of sunshine
And my tunes were played on the harp unstrung,
Would you hear my voice come through the music?
Would you hold it near as it were your own?

It's a hand-me-down, the thoughts are broken,
Perhaps they're better left unsung.
I don't know, don't really care
Let there be songs to fill the air.

Ripple in still water,
When there is no pebble tossed,
Nor wind to blow.