Bob Dylan The Gates Of Eden Lyrics

The Gates Of Eden Lyrics

Of war and peace the truth just twists, its curfew gull it glides
Upon
4-legged forest clouds the cowboy angel rides
With his candle lit into the
sun, though its glow is waxed in black
All except when 'neath the trees of
Eden

The lampost stands with folded arms, its iron claws attached
To
curbs 'neath holes where babies wail though it shadows metal badge
All in
all can only fall with a crashing but meaningless blow
No sound ever comes
from the gates of Eden

This savage soldier sticks his head in sand and
then complains
Unto the shoeless hunter who's gone deaf but still
remains
Upon the beach where hounddogs bay at ships with tattooed
sails
Heading for the gates of Eden

With a time-rusted compass blade,
Aladdin and his Lamp
Sits with utopian hermit monks, side-saddle on the
Golden Calf
And on their promises of paradise you will not hear a
laugh
All except inside the gates of Eden

Relationships of ownership
they whisper in the wings
To those condemned to act accordingly and wait for
succeeding kings
And I try to harmonize with songs the lonesome sparrow
sings
There are no kings inside the gates of Eden

The motorcycle
black madonna two-wheeled gypsy queen
And her silver studded phantom cause
the grey-flanneled dwarf to scream
As he weeps, two wicked birds of prey who
pick up on his breadcrumb sins
And there are no sins inside the gates of
Eden

The kingdoms of experience in the precious winds they rot
While
paupers change possessions - each one wishing for what the other has got
And
the princess and the prince discuss what's real and what is not
It doesn’t
matter inside the gates of Eden

The foreign sun it squints upon a bed
that is never mine
As friends and other strangers from their fates try to
resign
Leaving men wholly totally free to do anything they wish to do but
die
And there are no trials inside the gates of Eden

At dawn my lover
comes to me and tells me of her dreams
With no attempts to shovel the glimpse
into the ditch of what each one means
At times I think there are no words but
these to tell what's true
And there are no truths outside the gates of Eden.