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The 1995 folk song “Lake Marie” by John Prine is an odd one. It’s a beautiful ballad that combines three storylines — A Native American legend, the rise and fall of a marriage, and two gruesome murders — and weaves them together with sausages sssizzlin‘ on the grill.

Lake Marie is a real place in southern Wisconsin. Prine knew the lake from summer vacations there as a Chicago teenager.

He found the beginning of the song, the story of the Indian tribe, in a local library. The middle section, about good times at the lake and meeting a girl, is largely autobiographical. Prine explained the third section, the murders, in the late 1990s:

“The suburbs were kind of thought to be a pretty safe place at the time. And then some of these unexplained murders would show up every once in a while, where they’d find people in the woods somewhere.

“I just kinda took any one of them, not one in particular, and put it as if it was in a TV newscast. It was a sharp ‘left turn’ to take in a song.”

And it works very well.

Lake Marie

By John Prine, 1995
Written by John Prine

We were standing,
Standing by peaceful waters.
Standing by peaceful waters.
Whoa, ahh oh, ahh oh.

Many years ago, along the Illinois-Wisconsin border,
There was this Indian tribe.
They found two babies in the woods. White babies.
One of them was named Elizabeth.
She was the fairer of the two,
While the smaller and more fragile one
Was named Marie.

Having never seen white girls before,
And living on the two lakes known as the Twin Lakes,
They named the larger and more beautiful lake ‘Lake Elizabeth.’
And thus, the smaller lake that was hidden from the highway
Became known forever as ‘Lake Marie.’

We were standing,
Standing by peaceful waters.
Standing by peaceful waters.
Whoa, ahh oh, ahh oh.

Many years later, I found myself talking to this girl
Who was standing there with her back turned to Lake Marie.
The wind was blowing. Especially, through her hair.
There was four Italian sausages cookin’ on the outdoor grill.
And they was sssizzlin’!

Many years later, we found ourselves in Canada,
Trying to save our marriage.
And perhaps catch a few fish.
Whatever came first.
That night, she fell asleep in my arms,
Hummin’ the tune to ‘Louie Louie.’
Ahh, baby. We gotta go now.

We were standing,
Standing by peaceful waters.
Standing by peaceful waters.
Whoa, ahh oh, ahh oh.
Whoa, ahh oh, ahh oh.

The dogs were barkin’ as the cars were parkin’.
The loan sharks were sharkin’.
The narks were narkin’.
Practically everyone was there.
In the parking lot by the forest preserve,
The police had found two bodies.
Nay, naked bodies!

Their faces had been horribly disfigured
By some shhharp object.
I saw it on the news.
The TV news.
In a black and white video.

You know what blood looks like in a black and white video?
Shadows. Shadows!
That’s what it looks like.
All the love we shared between her and me was slammed —
Slammed up against the banks of old Lake Marie.
Marie!

We were standing,
Standing by peaceful waters.
Standing by peaceful waters.
Whoa, ahh oh, ahh oh.
Whoa, ahh oh, ahh oh.
Whoa, ahh oh, ahh oh.

Peaceful waters.
Standing by peaceful waters.

Ahh, baby. We gotta go now.