Before the Flood lyrics

Well, they'll stone you when you're trying to be so good

They'll stone you just like they said they would

They'll stone you when you're trying to go home

Then they'll stone you when you're there all alone

But I would not feel so all alone

Everybody must get stoned

Well, they'll stone you when you're walking on the street

They'll stone you when you're trying to keep your seat

You say you love me
And you're thinkin' of me,
But you know you could be wrong.
You say you told me
That you wanna hold me,
But you know you're not that strong.
I just can't do what I done before,
I just can't beg you any more.
I'm gonna let you pass
And I'll go last.
Then time will tell just who fell
And who's been left behind,
When you go your way and I go mine.

You say you disturb me

Once upon a time you dressed so fine
You threw the bums a dime in your prime, didn't you?
People'd call, say, Beware doll, you're bound to fall
You thought they were all kiddin' you
You used to laugh about
Everybody that was hangin' out
Now you don't talk so loud
Now you don't seem so proud
About having to be scrounging for your next meal.

How does it feel
How does it feel
To be without a home

Once upon a time you dressed so fine
Threw bums a dime in your prime, didn't you?
People called said beware doll, you're bound to fall
You thought they were all kidding you
You used to laugh about
People who were hanging out
Now you don't talk so loud
Now you don't seem so proud
About having to be scrounging your next meal

How does it feel, how does it feel?
To be on your own, without a home

Nobody feels any pain
Tonight as I stand inside the rain
Ev'rybody knows
That Baby's got new clothes
But lately I see her ribbons and her bows
Have fallen from her curls.
She takes just like a woman, yes, she does
She makes love just like a woman, yes, she does
And she aches just like a woman
But she breaks just like a little girl.

Queen Mary, she's my friend
Yes, I believe I'll go see her again

Nobody feels any pain
Tonight as I stand inside the rain
Ev'rybody knows
That Baby's got new clothes
But lately I see her ribbons and her bows
Have fallen from her curls.
She takes just like a woman, yes, she does
She makes love just like a woman, yes, she does
And she aches just like a woman
But she breaks just like a little girl.

Queen Mary, she's my friend
Yes, I believe I'll go see her again

Darkness at the break of noon
Shadows even the silver spoon
The handmade blade, the child's balloon
Eclipses both the sun and moon
To understand you know too soon
There is no sense in trying.

Pointed threats, they bluff with scorn
Suicide remarks are torn
From the fool's gold mouthpiece
The hollow horn plays wasted words
Proves to warn
That he not busy being born
Is busy dying.

The guilty undertaker sighs,
The lonesome organ grinder cries,
The silver saxophones say I should refuse you.
The cracked bells and washed-out horns
Blow into my face with scorn,
But it's not that way,
I wasn't born to lose you.
I want you, I want you,
I want you so bad,
Honey, I want you.

The drunken politician leaps
Upon the street where mothers weep
And the saviors who are fast asleep,

Oh God said to Abraham, Kill me a son
Abe says, Man, you must be puttin' me on
God say, No. Abe say, What?
God say, You can do what you want Abe, but
The next time you see me comin' you better run
Well Abe says, Where do you want this killin' done?
God says, Out on Highway 61.

Well Georgia Sam he had a bloody nose
Welfare Department they wouldn't give him no clothes

It ain't no use to sit and wonder why, babe
If you don't know by now
An' it ain't no use to sit and wonder why, babe
It'll never do somehow
When your rooster crows at the break of dawn
Look out your window and I'll be gone
You're the reason I'm trav'lin' on
Don't think twice, it's all right

It ain't no use in turnin' on your light, babe
That light I never knowed

Up on the withe varendaShe wears a nektie
and a panama het
Her passport shows a face
From another time and placeshe looks nothin' like that
And all the remnats of her
recent past are scatterd in the wild wind
she walks across the marblefloor
where a voice from the gambling room iscllin' her to come on in
she smiles
and walks the other way
as the last ship sails and the moon fades away

You walk into the room
With your pencil in your hand
You see somebody naked
And you say, Who is that man?
You try so hard
But you don't understand
Just what you'll say
When you get home

Because something is happening here
But you don't know what it is
Do you, Mister Jones?

You raise up your head
And you ask, Is this where it is?
And somebody points to you and says
It's his

There must be some way out of here, said the joker to the thief,
There's too much confusion, I can't get no relief.
Businessmen, they drink my wine, plowmen dig my earth,
None of them along the line know what any of it is worth.

No reason to get excited, the thief, he kindly spoke,
There are many here among us who feel that life is but a joke.

Take a silver dollar and put it in your pocket,
Never let it slip away.
Always be a man, not a boy gone astray.
When ya get half cra-zy from the August heat
Or on a frozen, rotted road
With no one to complain to about your achin' feet.
[Chorus:]
You're gonna walk that endless highway,
Walk that high-way till you die.
All you children goin' my way,
Better tell your home-life sweet goodbye.

Virgil Caine is the name,
and I served on the Danville train,
'Til Stoneman's cavalry
came and tore up the tracks again.
In the winter of '65,
We were hungry, just barely alive.
By May the tenth, Richmond had fell,
it's a time I remember, oh so well,
The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down,
and the bells were ringing,
The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down,
and the people were singin'.
They went

I pulled into Nazareth, was feelin' about half past dead;
I just need some place where I can lay my head.
"Hey, mister, can you tell me where a man might find a bed?"
He just grinned and shook my hand, and "No!", was all he said.
[Chorus:]
Take a load off Fanny, take a load for free;
Take a load off Fanny, And (and) (and) you can put the load right on me.

Go out yonder, peace in the valley
Come downtown, have to rumble in the alley
Oh, you don't know the shape I'm in
Has anybody seen my lady
This living alone will drive me crazy
Oh, you don't know the shape I'm in
I'm gonna go down by the wa - ter
But I ain't gonna jump in, no, no
I'll just be looking for my mak - er
And I hear that that's where she's been? Oh!
Out of nine lives, I spent seven

Ollie told me I'm a fool. So I
walked on down the road a mile, Went to the house that brings a smile
Sat upon my grandpa's knee, And what do you think he said to me?
[Chorus:]
When You Awake you will remember ev'rything, You will be
hangin' on a string from your... When you believe, You will relieve the only soul
That you were born with to grow old and never know

Now deep in the heart of a lonely kid
Who suffered so much for what he did,
They gave this ploughboy his fortune and fame,
Since that day he ain't been the same.
See the man with the stage fright
Just standin' up there to give it all his might.
And he got caught in the spotlight,
But when we get to the end
He wants to start all over again.
I've got fire water right on my breath

When I get off of this mountain
You know where I want to go
Straight down the Mississippi river
To the Gulf of Mexico
To Lake Charles, Louisiana
Little Bessie, a girl that I once knew
And she told me just to come on by
If there's anything she could do
[Chorus:]
Up on Cripple Creek she sends me
If I spring a leak she mends me
I don't have to speak she defends me

They say ev'rything can be replaced,
Yet ev'ry distance is not near.
So I remember ev'ry face
Of ev'ry man who put me here.
I see my light come shining
From the west unto the east.
Any day now, any day now,
I shall be released.
They say ev'ry man needs protection,
They say ev'ry man must fall.
Yet I swear I see my reflection
Some place so high above this wall.
I see my light come shining