A cold Saturday night and I’m watching a Bob Dylan and Joan Baez documentary on YouTube. Tomorrow I take the train up to Lille for a week’s vacation. It’s “les vacances scolaires” (school break) up north and I’ll be spending time with my favorite ten-year-old.
Joan was hopelessly in love with Bob. They were a couple in the early days, but it didn’t last. He moved on, but they did remain friends and in later years continued to sing together.
The song. Written in 1974, Joan Baez is singing to her former lover Bob Dylan, fondly reminiscing about their 1960s affair. Lyrics below. It’s a truly beautiful song, tinged with melancholy.
Well, I’ll be damned
Here comes your ghost again
But that’s not unusual
It’s just that the moon is full
And you happened to call
And here I sit
Hand on the telephone
Hearing a voice I’d known
A couple of light years ago
Heading straight for a fall
As I remember your eyes
Were bluer than robin’s eggs
My poetry was lousy you said
Where are you calling from?
A booth in the midwest
Ten years ago
I bought you some cufflinks
You brought me something
We both know what memories can bring
They bring diamonds and rust
Well, you burst on the scene
Already a legend
The unwashed phenomenon
The original vagabond
You strayed into my arms
And there you stayed
Temporarily lost at sea
The Madonna was yours for free
Yes, the girl on the half-shell
Could keep you unharmed
Now I see you standing
With brown leaves falling all around
And snow in your hair
Now you’re smiling out the window
Of that crummy hotel
Over Washington Square
Our breath comes out white clouds
Mingles and hangs in the air
Speaking strictly for me
We both could have died then and there
Now you’re telling me
You’re not nostalgic
Then give me another word for it
You who are so good with words
And at keeping things vague
‘Cause I need some of that vagueness now
It’s all come back too clearly
Yes, I loved you dearly
And if you’re offering me diamonds and rust
I’ve already paid.
Songwriter: Joan Baez
Juliet in Paris
Great song…I have been listening to Baez since her early folk song days
She really is a national treasure. I admire her enormously.
Terrific song which after listening led me on a short nostalgic trip to listening to a few of Gordon Lightfoot’s songs especially “If you could read my mind”.
Oh, I know those nostalgic trips, I take many of them.
Have you seen Martin Scorsese’s Rolling Thunder Revue on Netflix? (Bob Dylan tour of 1975). There’s a wonderful scene filmed in Gordon Lightfoot’s house in Toronto where Joni Mitchell is singing her new song, Coyote, while Dylan accompanies her on the guitar. Priceless.
No, but I will. Thanks!