Oh, the winds in Chicago have torn me to shreds
Reality has always had too many heads
Some things last longer than you think they will
There are some kind of things you can never kill
It's you and you only, I'm been thinking about
But you can't see in and it's hard lookin' out
I'm twenty miles out of town in cold irons bound
A contemporary classic of Dylan's includes Chicago in a key line opening a key verse in Cold Irons Bound. He keeps this one on his set list for most of his Chicago shows.
Not sure of the meaning behind the lyrics but the song's themes certainly line up with Chicago/good ole midwest philosophy. Really doesn't take more than 20 minutes to drive from Chicago's loop to Indiana's industrial Gary/Hammond region whose histories have been saturated with steel, manufacturing jobs and economic/life hardship to fit the themes. That struggle of knowing how tough circumstances originate but also knowing that what you know can't help solve the problem - that's what cold irons bound means to me.
From brendan mccarthy, Aug 2009