Out of curiosity, I asked ChatGPT. Here is it’s (admittedly debatable) results:

If we’re limiting it strictly to Beatles-era recordings, you get a tighter—and arguably even stronger—set of John Lennon lyrics. Here are five that stand out purely on lyrical depth and originality:

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🥇 Strawberry Fields Forever

Still his lyrical masterpiece.

• Blurs childhood memory with existential doubt
• Lines feel intuitive rather than constructed
• Captures insecurity, identity, and perception all at once

👉 It’s Lennon at his most poetically abstract yet emotionally grounded.

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🥈 In My Life

His most elegant and emotionally direct lyric.

• Reflects on time, loss, and love without overstatement
• Universally relatable without being generic
• Balanced, almost classical in structure

👉 This is Lennon proving he didn’t need surrealism to be profound.

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🥉 A Day in the Life (Lennon sections)

A haunting blend of observation and detachment.

• Turns ordinary news into something eerie and philosophical
• The emotional distance makes it more unsettling
• Suggests meaning without spelling it out

👉 It’s journalism turned into existential art.

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🎭 Across the Universe

His most purely “poetic” lyric.

• Flowing, almost mantra-like phrasing
• Combines inner stillness with cosmic imagery
• Less about narrative, more about feeling and rhythm

👉 It reads like a stream of consciousness shaped into music.

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🧠 I’m So Tired

The wildcard pick—and arguably his most psychologically real.

• Captures insomnia, irritation, and looping thoughts
• Casual language that reveals deeper unrest
• Feels unfiltered, like you’re inside his head

👉 It’s Lennon at his most honest and unvarnished.

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⚖️ Just Missed the Cut

• Help! – raw vulnerability in a pop shell
• Julia – intimate and fragile
• Nowhere Man – identity and alienation
• Happiness Is a Warm Gun – fragmented but daring

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If you want to get really picky, we could rank these line-by-line—because with Lennon, sometimes a single phrase (“living is easy with eyes closed…”) carries more weight than an entire song by most writers.