Early one mornin' the sun was shinin'.
I was laying in bed
Wond'rin' if she'd changed it all;
If her hair was still red.
Her folks, they said, our lives together
Sure was gonna be rough.
They never did like Mama's homemade dress.
Papa's bankbook wasn't big enough
And I was standin' on the side of the road,
Rain fallin' on my shoes,
Heading out for the east coast.
Lord knows I've paid some dues gettin' through,
Tangled up in blue.
She was married when we first meet.
Soon to be divorced.
I helped her out of a jam, I guess,
But I used a little too much force.
We drove that car as far as we could;
Abandoned it out west.
Split it up on a dark sad night;
Both agreein' it was best.
She turned around to look at me
As I was walkin' away.
I heard her say over my shoulder
"We'll meet again someday on the avenue."
Tangled up in blue.
I had a job in the great north woods
Workin' as a cook for a spell,
But I never did like it all that much
And one day the axe just fell.
So I drifted down to New Orleans
Where I was lucky to be employed
Workin' for a while on a fishin' boat
Right outside of Delacroix,
But all the while I was alone.
The past was close behind.
I seen a lot of women,
But she never escaped my mind and I just grew
Tangled up in blue.
She was workin' in a topless place
And I stopped in for a beer.
I just kept lookin' at the side of her face
In the spotlight so clear
And later on as the crowd thinned out
I's just about to do the same,
She was standin' there in back of my chair.
Said to me, "Don't I know your name?"
I muttered somethin' underneath my breath.
She studied the lines on my face.
I must admit I felt a little uneasy
When she bent down to tie the laces of my shoe.
Tangled up in blue.
She lit a burner on the stove
And offered me a pipe.
"I thought you'd never say hello," she said,
"You look like the silent type."
Then she opened up a book of poems
And handed it to me.
Written by an Italian poet
From the thirteenth century
And every one of them words rang true
And glowed like burnin' coal
Pourin' off of every page
Like it was written in my soul from me to you
Tangled up in blue.
I lived with them on Montague Street
In a basement down the stairs.
There was music in the cafes at night
And revolution in the air.
Then he started into dealin' with slaves
And somethin' inside of him died.
She had to sell everything she owned
And froze up inside
And when finally the bottom fell out,
I became withdrawn.
The only thing I knew how to do
Was to keep on keepin' on like a bird that flew
Tangled up in blue.
So now I'm goin' back again.
I got to get her somehow.
All the people we used to know;
They're an illusion to me now.
Some are mathematicians.
Some are carpenter's wives.
Don't know how it all got started.
I don't what they're doin' with their lives,
But me, I'm still on the road
Headin' for another joint.
We always did feel the same.
We just saw it from a different point of view.
Tangled up in blue.