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I think the following two songs, while utterly different in many, are interesting possible sisters..
Absolutely Sweet Marie
Well, your railroad gate, you know I just can’t jump it Sometimes it gets so hard, you see I’m just sitting here beating on my trumpet With all these promises you left for me But where are you tonight, sweet Marie?
Well, I waited for you when I was half sick Yes, I waited for you when you hated me Well, I waited for you inside of the frozen traffic When you knew I had some other place to be Now, where are you tonight, sweet Marie?
Well, anybody can be just like me, obviously But then, now again, not too many can be like you, fortunately
Well, six white horses that you did promise Were fin’lly delivered down to the penitentiary But to live outside the law, you must be honest I know you always say that you agree But where are you tonight, sweet Marie?
Well, I don’t know how it happened But the riverboat captain, he knows my fate But ev’rybody else, even yourself They’re just gonna have to wait
Well, I got the fever down in my pockets The Persian drunkard, he follows me Yes, I can take him to your house but I can’t unlock it You see, you forgot to leave me with the key Oh, where are you tonight, sweet Marie?
Now, I been in jail when all my mail showed That a man can’t give his address out to bad company And now I stand here lookin’ at your yellow railroad In the ruins of your balcony Wond’ring where you are tonight, sweet Marie
Where Are You Tonight? (Journey Through Dark Heat)
There’s a long-distance train rolling through the rain, Tears on the letter I write. There’s a woman I long to touch and I miss her so much But she’s drifting like a satellite. There’s a neon light ablaze in this green smoky haze, Laughter down on Elizabeth Street And a lonesome bell tone in that valley of stone Where she bathed in a stream of pure heat. Her father would emphasize you got to be more than streetwise But he practiced what he preached from the heart. A full-blooded Cherokee, he predicted to me The time and the place that the trouble would start.
There’s a babe in the arms of a woman in a rage And a longtime golden-haired stripper onstage And she winds back the clock and she turns back the page Of a book that no one can write. Oh, where are you tonight?
The truth was obscure, too profound and too pure, To live it you have to explode. In that last hour of need, we entirely agreed, Sacrifice was the code of the road. I left town at dawn, with Marcel and St. John, Strong men belittled by doubt. I couldn’t tell her what my private thoughts were But she had some way of finding them out. He took dead-center aim but he missed just the same, She was waiting, putting flowers on the shelf. She could feel my despair as I climbed up her hair And discovered her invisible self.
There’s a lion in the road, there’s a demon escaped, There’s a million dreams gone, there’s a landscape being raped, As her beauty fades and I watch her undrape, I won’t but then again, maybe I might. Oh, if I could just find you tonight.
I fought with my twin, that enemy within, ’Til both of us fell by the way. Horseplay and disease is killing me by degrees While the law looks the other way. Your partners in crime hit me up for nickels and dimes, The guy you were lovin’ couldn’t stay clean. It felt outa place, my foot in his face, But he should-a stayed where his money was green. I bit into the root of forbidden fruit With the juice running down my leg. Then I dealt with your boss, who’d never known about loss And who always was too proud to beg. There’s a white diamond gloom on the dark side of this room And a pathway that leads up to the stars. If you don’t believe there’s a price for this sweet paradise, Remind me to show you the scars.
There’s a new day at dawn and I’ve finally arrived. If I’m there in the morning, baby, you’ll know I’ve survived. I can’t believe it, I can’t believe I’m alive, But without you it just doesn’t seem right. Oh, where are you tonight?
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