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Blues for Allah

1975

Help On The Way / Slip Knot!
Franklin's Tower
King Solomon's Marbles
Stronger Than Dirt
Milkin' The Turkey
The Music Never Stopped
Crazy Fingers
Sage And Spirit
Blues For Allah
 
Help On The Way
Paradise waits
on the crest of a wave
her angels in flame
She has no pain
Like a child, she is pure
She is not to blame

Poised for flight
Wings spread bright 
Spring from night
into the sun
Don't stop to run
She can fly like a lie 
She cannot be outdone

Tell me the cost
I can pay
Let me go
Tell me love is not lost
Sell everything
Without love, day to day,
insanity's king

I will pay
day by day
anyway
Lock, bolt, and key
Crippled but free
I was blind 
all the time
I was learning to see

Help on the way
I know only this
I've got you today
Don't fly away
'cause I love what I love
and I want it that way

I will stay
one more day
Like I say
Honey it's you
Without love in the dream
It will never come true 

Franklin's Tower
In another time's forgotten space
your eyes looked through your mother's face
Wildflower seed on the sand and stone
may the four winds blow you safely home

Roll away . . . the dew 
Roll away . . . the dew 
Roll away . . . the dew 
Roll away . . . the dew 

You ask me where the four winds dwell
In Franklin's Tower there hangs a bell
It can ring, turn night to day
Ring like fire when you lose your way

Roll away . . . the dew 
Roll away . . . the dew 
Roll away . . . the dew 
Roll away . . . the dew 

God help the child who rings that bell
It may have one good ring left, you can't tell
One watch by night, one watch by day
If you get confused, listen to the music play

Roll away . . . the dew 
Roll away . . . the dew 
Roll away . . . the dew 
Roll away . . . the dew 

Some come to laugh their past away
Some come to make it just one more day
Whichever way your pleasure tends
If you plant ice, you're gonna harvest wind

Roll away . . . the dew 
Roll away . . . the dew 
Roll away . . . the dew 
Roll away . . . the dew 

In Franklin's Tower the four winds sleep
Like four lean hounds the lighthouse keep
Wildflower seeds in the sand and wind
May the four winds blow you home again

Roll away . . . the dew 
Roll away . . . the dew 
Roll away . . . the dew 
Roll away . . . the dew 
You better roll away 
the dew. . . . 

Crazy Fingers
Your rain falls like crazy fingers
Peals of fragile thunder keeping time

Recall the days that still are to come
Some sing blue

Hang your heart on laughing willow
Stray down to the water
Deep Sea of Love

Beneath the sweet calm face of the sea
Swift undertow

Life may be sweeter for this, I don't know
See how it feels in the end
May Lady Lullaby sing plainly for you
Soft, strong, sweet and true

Cloud hands reaching from a rainbow
Tapping at the window touch your hair

So swift and bright
Strange figures of light
Float in air

Who can stop what must arrive now?
Something new is waiting to be born

Dark as the night
You're still by my side
Shining side

Gone are the days we stopped to decide
Where we should go
We just ride

Gone are the broken eyes we saw through 
in dreams
Gone -- both dream and lie

Life may be sweeter for this, I don't know
Feels like it might be alright
While Lady Lullaby sings plainly for you
Love still rings true

Midnight on a carousel ride
Reaching for the gold ring down inside

Never could reach
It just slips away but I try

"'Crazy Fingers' is a collection of haiku-style verses, mostly seventeen syllables, some more successful than others, with no connecting link
other than similarity of mood." -- Robert Hunter 

Blues for Allah
Arabian wind
The Needle's Eye is thin
The Ships of State sail on mirage
and drown in sand
in No-Man's Land
Where ALLAH does command

What good is spilling 
blood? It will not 
grow a thing

"TASTE ETERNITY" 
the swords sings Blues for ALLAH
In'sh'ALLAH

They lie where they fall
There's nothing more to say
The desert stars are bright tonight,
let's meet as friends
The flower of Islam
The fruit of Abraham

The thousand stories have
come 'round to one again
Arabian Night
our gods pursue their fight
What fatal flowers of 
darkness spring from 
seeds of light

Bird of Paradise--Fly 
In white sky
Blues for ALLAH
In'sh'ALLAH

Let's see with our heart
these things our eyes have seen
and know the truth will still lie
somewhere in between

Under eternity
Under eternity
Under eternity 
Blue
Bird of Paradise
Fly 
In white sky
Blues 
for ALLAH
In'sh'ALLAH

"This lyric is a requiem for King Faisal of Saudi Arabia, a progressive and democratically inclined ruler (and, incidentally, a fan of the Grateful Dead) whose assassination in 1975 shocked us personally. The lyrics were printed in Arabic on the jacket of the Middle East release of the album." -- Robert Hunter