Expecting Rain

Especially if there's a mule or two in there as well.[/quote]

Was thinking of that earlier:

'My ears hear a symphony
Of two mules, trains and rain...'

and, of course, there's...

'A long-distance train rolling through the rain'

(Apologies for going slightly off-topic)

Ditto

First that sprung to mind was:

At midnight all the agents
And the super-human crew
Go and out and round up everyone
Who knows more than they do
Then they take them to the factory
Where the heart attack machine
Is strapped across their shoulders
And then the kerosene
Is brought down from the castles
By insurance men who go
Check to see that no-one is escaping to
Desolation Row.

"Visions of Johanna" has a train, rain, and a mule too, though not in the same place.

"Visions of Johanna" has a train, rain, and a mule too, though not in the same place.[/quote]

Too true. And from 'Man of Constant Sorrow' (1st album):

Through this open world I'm a-bound to ramble
Through ice and snow, sleet and rain
I'm a-bound to ride that mornin' railroad
Perhaps I'll die upon that train...

I paid 15 cents, didn't care if I was right or wrong
I paid 15 cents, didn't care if I was right or wrong
Then I saddled up a nightmare and rode her all night long!

I've never heard this verse commented on. Is it too obvious or does nobody get it but me?

I count the years and I shed no tears
I'm blinded to what might have been
Nature's voice makes my heart rejoice
Play me the wild song of the wind
I found hopeless love in the room above
Where the sun and the weather were mild
You're as fine as wine, I ain't handing you no line
But I have to put you down for a while.

Not the most poetic but it has the ring of truth, at least for me.

One verse from one song is more or less impossible but there must be a contender here!

You got a lotta nerve
To say you are my friend
When I was down
You just stood there grinning

You got a lotta nerve
To say you got a helping hand to lend
You just want to be on
The side that’s winning

You say I let you down
You know it’s not like that
If you’re so hurt
Why then don’t you show it

You say you lost your faith
But that’s not where it’s at
You had no faith to lose
And you know it

and he keeps the best until the end of the song...

Yes, I wish that for just one time
You could stand inside my shoes
You’d know what a drag it is
To see you

Fantastic stuff!

Oh, the union central is pullin' out
The orchids are in bloom
I've only got me one good shirt left and it smells of stale perfume
In fourteen months I've only smiled once and I didn't do it consciously
Somebody's got to find your trail
I guess it must be up to me

Literally everything nominated here is somewhere between "soooooo cool" and "sooooooo beautiful"...

Seductive thread here. We could go on endlessly pointing out the incredible verses.

Indulge me in a last one:

Through the mad mystic hammering of the wild ripping hail
The sky cracked its poems in naked wonder
That the clinging of the church bells blew far into the breeze
Leaving only bells of lightning and its thunder
Striking for the gentle, striking for the kind
Striking for the guardians and protectors of the mind
An' the poet and the painter far behind his rightful time
An' we gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing

My favourite moments in his songs are when you get a glimpse of something real about the writer. For example :
woke up on the roadside
Daydreamin' 'bout the way things sometimes are
Visions of your chestnut mare
Shoot through my head and are makin' me see stars

There are plenty of these, probably better than this one. It is not generic, but very specific and yet not what the song is about necessarily. It goes beyond the words on the page. They are fleeting and more like a byproduct. If I could pinpoint what i find most intriguing about dylan’s Songs, and what is most innovative, that might be it.

Well if we're allowed two

If today was not a crooked highway
If tonight was not a crooked trail
If tomorrow wasn't such a long time
Then lonesome would mean nothing to me at all.
And only if my own true love was waiting
If I could hear her heart softly pounding
Only if she was lying by me
Would I lie in my bed once again.

People tell me it's a sin
To know and feel too much within
I still believe she was my twin
But I lost the ring
She was born in spring
But I was born too late
Blame it on a simple twist of fate

I love that Simple Twist of Fate verse. Deep down inside...

I love the lyrics of this song, here the climactic last verse:

Starry-eyed an' laughing as I recall when we were caught
Trapped by no track of hours for they hanged suspended
As we listened one last time an' we watched with one last look
Spellbound an' swallowed 'til the tolling ended
Tolling for the aching whose wounds cannot be nursed
For the countless confused, accused, misused, strung-out ones an' worse
An' for every hung-up person in the whole wide universe
An' we gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing