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The creek don't rise

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Dylan leblanc if the creek don t rise


The expression "...the creek don't rise" is an American slang expression implying strong intentions subject to complete frustration by uncommon but not unforeseeable events. It presumably evokes occasional and unpredictably extreme rainfall in Appalachia, that has historically isolated one rural neighborhood or another temporarily inaccessible on several or many occasions.

Contents

Classic versions of its use tend to be along the lines of "The good Lord willing, and creek doesn't rise"—i.e. "If God so wills, and as long as intense rain does not wash away bridges or parts of dirt roads, or cover roads too deeply for safely following them." It may take the form of real or mock dialect, in variations like "... Lor' willin' an' th' crick don' rise."

God willin the creek don t rise live on letterman


Song titles and lyrics

Jerry Reed wrote by 1955, and he and Johnny Cash each recorded, his If the Good Lord's Willing and the Creek(s) Don't Rise; the recordings of each of them use, at the same point within different verses, different phrases ("...creek stays down", "... creek stay low", "... creeks don't rise") that accommodate different rhymings, and at least three additional artists have recorded what are frank variations of that song.

At least five later separately composed modern songs in English have been recorded since 1960, evoking the "God ... " or "Good Lord willing" expression or the "creek(s) don't rise" one, two of them coupling the two phrases, and in the order Reed used.

Moving-image works

  • Spike Lee's documentary series If God Is Willing and Da Creek Don't Rise
  • References

    The creek don't rise Wikipedia


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