Bob Dylan once wrote a poem as a tribute to this folk music giant. Titled “Last Thoughts on Woody Guthrie”, Dylan recited it once at a concert – specifically, at the Town Hall in New York City on April 12, 1963 according to Wikipedia. I have it on one of my Dylan bootleg albums, and it is also included in what is probably the biggest bootleg product of all time, the 10-LP box set Ten of Swords (1986). The first legitimate release is on The Bootleg Series, Vols. 1-3 (Rare & Unreleased) 1961-1991 (1991).
Introducing the poem at the end of his concert, Bob Dylan said that he had been asked to provide something for a book about Woody Guthrie: “. . . what does Woody Guthrie mean to you in 25 words? I couldn’t do it. I wrote five pages. And, I have it here, have it here by accident, actually.”
Many people only think of Bob Dylan as a lyricist for his songs or maybe as a free-verse poet; but if there were ever any doubts about the man’s power as a true poet of the first order, “Last Thoughts on Woody Guthrie” dispels them forever. The lines have a free-verse feel to them, though mostly they rhyme, and there is the same conversational tone that Woody Guthrie used in his own work. There is a breathless, exhilarating rush to the poem – it is nothing less than the search for the meaning of life amid the dross of the modern world. While nothing can top hearing Dylan speak the words himself, the entire poem can be found here on bobdylan.com, Dylan’s official website – www.bobdylan.com/us/songs/last-thoughts-woody-guthrie. It pains me to have to cut it short, but there are more than 200 lines in all, so here are some excerpts:
When yer head gets twisted and yer mind grows numb
When you think you’re too old, too young, too smart or too dumb
When yer laggin’ behind an’ losin’ yer pace
In a slow-motion crawl of life’s busy race
No matter what yer doing if you start givin’ up
If the wine don’t come to the top of yer cup
If the wind’s got you sideways with one hand holdin’ on
And the other starts slipping and the feeling is gone
And yer train engine fire needs a new spark to catch it
And the wood’s easy findin’ but yer lazy to fetch it . . .
And to yourself you sometimes say
“I never knew it was gonna be this way
Why didn’t they tell me the day I was born”
And you start gettin’ chills and yer jumping from sweat
And you’re lookin’ for somethin’ you ain’t quite found yet . . .
You need something to open up a new door
To show you something you seen before
But overlooked a hundred times or more
You need something to open your eyes
You need something to make it known
That it’s you and no one else that owns
That spot that yer standing, that space that you’re sitting
That the world ain’t got you beat
That it ain’t got you licked
It can’t get you crazy no matter how many
Times you might get kicked
You need something special all right
You need something special to give you hope
But hope’s just a word
That maybe you said or maybe you heard
On some windy corner ’round a wide-angled curve . . .
No you’ll not now or no other day
Find it on the doorsteps made out-a paper maché
And inside it the people made of molasses
That every other day buy a new pair of sunglasses
And it ain’t in the fifty-star generals and flipped-out phonies
Who’d turn yuh in for a tenth of a penny
Who breathe and burp and bend and crack
And before you can count from one to ten
Do it all over again but this time behind yer back
My friend . . .
And you yell to yourself and you throw down yer hat
Sayin’, “Christ do I gotta be like that
Ain’t there no one here that knows where I’m at
Ain’t there no one here that knows how I feel
Good God Almighty
THAT STUFF AIN'T REAL”
No but that ain’t yer game, it ain’t even yer race
You can’t hear yer name, you can’t see yer face
You gotta look some other place
And where do you look for this hope that yer seekin’
Where do you look for this lamp that’s a-burnin’
Where do you look for this oil well gushin’
Where do you look for this candle that’s glowin’
Where do you look for this hope that you know is there
And out there somewhere
And your feet can only walk down two kinds of roads
Your eyes can only look through two kinds of windows
Your nose can only smell two kinds of hallways
You can touch and twist
And turn two kinds of doorknobs
You can either go to the church of your choice
Or you can go to Brooklyn State Hospital
You’ll find God in the church of your choice
You’ll find Woody Guthrie in Brooklyn State Hospital
And though it’s only my opinion
I may be right or wrong
You’ll find them both
In the Grand Canyon
At sundown
(March 2015)
