A hundred years old or maybe much older

No-one knows when his star rose.

Kept barely alive since he was seventy-five

By machines and tubes up his nose.

He's outlived his children but he doesn't know that

He don't even know his own name

His life's in the hands of a man out to show that

Both life and death can be the same.

There's cancer and cardiac failure

Asbestosis and AIDS

You don't pass away for no reason

And nobody dies of old age.

Methuselah lived a long time in the Bible

Nine hundred years maybe more.

He had hundreds of children and he formed a tribe

So he wasn't exactly poor.

He got paid for his name on health products and potions,

For interviews he got a bit

His kids all brought home their pay-packets, unopened

He got a fortune in child-benefit.

There's cancer and cardiac failure

Asbestosis and AIDS

You don't pass away for no reason

And nobody dies of old age.

If he died today, before they took him away,

A full autopsy would decide

Not the many good reasons why he kept on living

But to find the one reason he died.

They would look at his lungs, his liver and tongue,

Wonder, was it a great heart attack.

At the end of the day, whatever they say

He died from living , in fact.

There's cancer and cardiac failure

Asbestosis and AIDS

You don't pass away for no reason

And nobody dies of old age.

You don't pass away for no reason

And nobody dies of old age.