Beeswing

(album: Rant - 2012)

I came to town and they called it the summer
I came to town and they called it the summer
I was nineteen when I came to town
and they called it the summer of love
they were burning babies, burning flags
there were hawks against the doves
I got a job in the steamie down on Cauldrum Street
fell in love with a laundry girl
who was working next to me

[Chorus:]
Oh she was a rare thing, fine as a bee's wing
so fine a breath of wind might blow her away
she was a lost child, oh she was a running wild
she said, "As long as there's no price on love,
As long as there's no price on love
As long as there's no price on love, I'll stay
wouldn't want me any other way"

I came to town and they called it the summer
I came to town and they called it the summer
Brown hair zig-zag around her face
and a look of half surprise
like a fox caught in the headlights
there was animal in her eyes
she said, "Young man, can't you see
I'm not the factory kind
if you don't take me out of here
I'll surely lose my mind"

[Chorus]

We busked around the market towns
and picked fruit down in Kent
we could tinker lamps and pots
and knives wherever we went
and I said that we might settle down
get a few acres dug
fire burning in the hearth and babies on the rug
She said "Oh man, you foolish man
it surely sounds like hell
you may be Lord of half the world
but you'll not own me as well"

[Chorus]

We was camping down the Gower one time
and the work was pretty good
she thought we shouldn't wait for the drost
and I thought maybe we should
we was drinking more in those days
and tempers reached a pitch
like a fool I let her run
with the rambling itch
On the last I heard she's sleeping rough
back on the Derby beat
White Horse in her hip pocket
and a wolfhound at her feet
and they even say she married once
a man named Romany Brown
but even a gypsy caravan
was too much settling down
And they say her flower is faded now
hard weather and hard booze
but maybe that's the price
you pay for the chains you refuse

[Chorus]