Hejira

[Verse 1:] I'm traveling in some vehicle I'm sitting in some cafe A defector from the petty wars That shell shock love away There's comfort in melancholy When there's no need to explain It's just as natural as the weather In this moody sky today In our possessive coupling So much could not be expressed So now I'm returning to myself These things that you and I suppressed I see something of myself in everyone Just at this moment of the world As snow gathers like bolts of lace Waltzing on a ballroom girl [Verse 2:] You know it never has been easy Whether you do or you do not resign Whether you travel the breadth of extremities Or stick to some straighter line Now here's a man and a woman sitting on a rock They're either going to thaw out or freeze Listen Strains of Benny Goodman Coming through the snow and the pinewood trees I'm porous with travel fever But you know I'm so glad to be on my own Still somehow the slightest touch of a stranger Can set up trembling in my bones * I know no one's going to show me everything We all come and go unknown Each so deep and superficial Between the forceps and the stone [Verse 3:] Well I looked at the granite markers Those tribute to finality to eternity And then I looked at myself here Chicken scratching for my immortality In the church they light the candles And the wax rolls down like tears There's the hope and the hopelessness I've witnessed thirty years We're only particles of change I know I know Orbiting around the sun But how can I have that point of view When I'm always bound and tied to someone White flags of winter chimneys Waving truce against the moon In the mirrors of a modern bank From the window of a hotel room [Verse 4:] I'm traveling in some vehicle I'm sitting in some cafe A defector from the petty wars Until love sucks me back that way