BOB DYLAN 'THE CHAMELEON POET' by John Bauldie (Route)

BOB DYLAN

 THE CHAMELEON POET

by John Bauldie

[ROUTE]

BOB DYLAN | FOURTH TIME AROUND | LIVERPOOL 2001

A special and tender performance of ‘Fourth Time Around’ in Liverpool in 2001, home city of The Beatles whose ‘Norwegian Wood’ is explicitly connected to this song. Bob Dylan didn’t perform the song at any other show on the European leg of his tour that year.

In ‘The Chameleon Poet’, John Bauldie describes 'Fourth Time Around' as one of a suite of songs on Blonde On Blonde that represent Bob Dylan’s ‘nigredo’ – ‘a weariness of soul … where disorientation and weakness and hopelessness are the quality of life’. 

More on ‘The Chameleon Poet’ here: http://www.route-online.com/.../the-chameleon-poet-bob...

When she said, "Don't waste your words, they're just lies, "

I cried she was deaf.

And she worked on my face until breaking my eyes,

Then said, "What else you got left?"

It was then that I got up to leave

But she said, "Don't forget,

Everybody must give something back

For something they get."

I stood there and hummed,

I tapped on her drum

I asked her how come.

And she buttoned her boot,

And straightened her suit,

Then she said, "Don't get cute."

So I forced my hands in my pockets

And felt with my thumbs,

And gallantly handed her

My very last piece of gum.

She threw me outside,

I stood in the dirt where everyone walked.

And after finding I'd forgotten my shirt,

I went back and knocked.

I waited in the hallway, she went to get it,

And I tried to make sense

Out of that picture of you in your wheelchair

That leaned up against

Her Jamaican rum

And when she did come, I asked her for some.

She said, "No, dear."

I said, "Your words aren't clear,

You'd better spit out your gum."

She screamed till her face got so red,

Then she fell on the floor,

And I covered her up and then

Thought I'd go look through her drawer.

And when I was through

I filled up my shoe and brought it to you.

And you, you took me in,

You loved me then, you never wasted time.

And I, I never took much,

I never asked for your crutch

And I don't ask for mine.