[00:05.42]Desolation Row
[00:06.32]Bob Dylan
[00:07.47]
[00:10.74]They're selling postcards of the hanging
[00:15.05]They're painting the passports brown
[00:20.12]The beauty parlor is filled with sailors
[00:23.61]The circus is in town
[00:29.47]Here comes the blind commissioner
[00:33.15]They've got him in a trance
[00:37.61]One hand is tied to the tight-rope walker
[00:42.41]The other is in his pants
[00:47.11]And the riot squad they're restless
[00:51.50]They need somewhere to go
[00:55.91]As Lady and I look out tonight
[01:00.58]From Desolation Row
[01:09.44]Cinderella, she seems so easy
[01:14.08]\"It takes one to know one,\" she smiles
[01:18.72]And puts her hands in her back pockets
[01:23.24]Bette Davis style
[01:27.58]And in comes Romeo, he's moaning
[01:32.04]\"You Belong to Me I Believe\"
[01:35.91]And someone says,\" You're in the wrong place, my friend
[01:40.13]You better leave\"
[01:45.48]And the only sound that's left
[01:48.63]After the ambulances go
[01:54.66]Is Cinderella sweeping up
[01:58.94]On Desolation Row
[02:03.14]
[02:05.72]Now the moon is almost hidden
[02:12.60]The stars are beginning to hide
[02:16.60]The fortunetelling lady
[02:21.12]Has even taken all her things inside
[02:25.60]All except for Cain and Abel
[02:28.75]And the hunchback of Notre Dame
[02:34.70]Everybody is making love
[02:38.63]Or else expecting rain
[02:43.40]And the Good Samaritan, he's dressing
[02:47.63]He's getting ready for the show
[02:52.06]He's going to the carnival tonight
[02:56.79]On Desolation Row
[03:05.32]Now Ophelia, she's 'neath the window
[03:09.31]For her I feel so afraid
[03:13.68]On her twenty-second birthday
[03:17.39]She already is an old maid
[03:22.27]To her, death is quite romantic
[03:26.84]She wears an iron vest
[03:31.56]Her profession's her religion
[03:35.82]Her sin is her lifelessness
[03:40.60]
[03:45.31]Noah's great rainbow
[03:49.42]She spends her time peeking
[03:53.37]Into Desolation Row
[04:02.75]Einstein, disguised as Robin Hood
[04:07.02]With his memories in a trunk
[04:11.54]Passed this way an hour ago
[04:15.31]With his friend, a jealous monk
[04:19.81]He looked so immaculately frightful
[04:24.93]As he bummed a cigarette
[04:28.06]Then he went off sniffing drainpipes
[04:32.54]And reciting the alphabet
[04:37.33]Now you would not think to look at him
[04:41.52]But he was famous long ago
[04:46.43]For playing the electric violin
[04:49.97]On Desolation Row
[04:54.81]
[04:59.27]Dr. Filth, he keeps his world
[05:03.34]Inside of a leather cup
[05:08.03]But all his sexless patients
[05:11.98]They're trying to blow it up
[05:17.08]Now his nurse, some local loser
[05:21.12]She's in charge of the cyanide hose
[05:25.44]And she also keeps the cards that read
[05:29.91]\"Have Mercy on His Soul\"
[05:33.95]They all play on penny whistles
[05:38.48]You can hear them blow
[05:42.98]If you lean your head out far enough
[05:47.72]From Desolation Row
[05:55.41]Across the street they've nailed the curtains
[06:01.68]They're getting ready for the feast
[06:04.56]The Phantom of the Opera
[06:08.42]A perfect image of a priest
[06:12.87]They're spoonfeeding Casanova
[06:16.84]To get him to feel more assured
[06:21.36]Then they'll kill him with self-confidence
[06:25.60]After poisoning him with words
[06:29.97]And the Phantom's shouting to skinny girls
[06:35.83]\"Get Outa Here If You Don't Know
[06:40.46]Casanova is just being punished for going
[06:43.83]To Desolation Row\"
[06:53.40]Now at midnight all the agents
[06:59.02]And the superhuman crew
[07:02.23]Come out and round up everyone
[07:05.97]That knows more than they do
[07:10.48]Then they bring them to the factory
[07:15.14]Where the heart-attack machine
[07:19.38]Is strapped across their shoulders
[07:23.08]And then the kerosene
[07:28.09]Is brought down from the castles
[07:32.26]By insurance men who go
[07:36.19]Check to see that nobody is escaping
[07:40.66]To Desolation Row
[07:45.75]
[07:47.79]Praise be to Nero's Neptune
[07:51.09]The Titanic sails at dawn
[07:56.20]And everybody's shouting
[08:00.46]\"Which Side Are You On?\"
[08:04.97]And Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot
[08:08.98]Fighting in the captain's tower
[08:13.77]While calypso singers laugh at them
[08:17.78]And fishermen hold flowers
[08:22.77]Between the windows of the sea
[08:26.65]Where lovely mermaids flow
[08:30.77]And nobody has to think too much
[08:35.29]About Desolation Row
[08:40.13]
[09:35.03]Yes, I received your letter yesterday
[09:38.60](About the time the door knob broke)
[09:43.80]When you asked how I was doing
[09:47.76]Was that some kind of joke?
[09:52.07]All these people that you mention
[09:56.39]Yes, I know them, they're quite lame
[10:00.64]I had to rearrange their faces
[10:03.99]And give them all another name
[10:08.64]Right now I can't read too good
[10:13.43]Don't send me no more letters no
[10:16.47]Not unless you mail them
[10:22.77]From Desolation Row
[10:28.11]