early one morning the sun was shining i was laying in bed wondering if she d changed at 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 me i was standing on the side of the road rain falling all on my shoes i m heading out for the east coast lord knows i ve paid some dues getting through tangled up in blue she was married when we first met 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 up on a sad dark night both agreeing it was best she turned around to look at me as i was walking away and i heard her say over my shoulder we ll meet again someday on the avenue tangled up in blue well i was living in the great north woods working as a cook for a spell but i never did like it all that much and one day the ax just fell so i drifted down to new orleans where i happened to be employed yeah i was working for a while on a fishing boat right outside of delacroix and 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 working at a topless bar and i stopped in for a beer i just kept looking at the side of her face in the spotlight so clear now later on the crowd thinned out and i was just about to do the same she was standing there in the back of my chair she said don t i know your name i muttered something 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 and then she opened up a book of poems and handed it to me written by an italian poet from the thirteenth century every one of those words rang true and glowed like burning coal pouring 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 yeah there was music in the cafes at night and revolution in the air that s when he started into dealing with slaves yeah something inside of her died just died and she had to sell everything she owned and she froze up inside finally when the bottom fell out i became withdrawn the only thing i knew how to do was to keep on keeping on like a bird that flew tangled up in blue oh yeah now i m headed back again i got to get to her somehow and all the people that i used to know they re an illusion to me now some are mathematicians some are carpenter s wives i don t know how they all got started i don t know what they re doing with their lives but me i m still on the road headed for another joint we always did feel the same we just saw it from a different point of view tangled up in blue whoo scarlet rivera and jane scarpantoni 