It is notable that the brief 1968-69 revival in Beatle music is led by Paul and Grorge.
...And not too long after that Lennon let us know what he imagined:
When asked about the song in one of his last interviews, Lennon declared "Imagine" to be as good as anything he had written with the Beatles.
In a 1980 interview with David Sheff for Playboy magazine, Lennon remarks on the message of "Imagine":
With "Imagine" we're asking, "can you imagine a world without countries or religions?" It's the same message over and over. And it's positive.
Ono indicated that the lyrical content of "Imagine" was "just what John believed — that we are all one country, one world, one people. He wanted to get that idea out."
In the book Lennon in America, by Geoffrey Giuliano, Lennon commented that Imagine was an "anti-religious, anti-nationalistic, anti-conventional, anti-capitalistic [song], but because it's sugar-coated, it's accepted."