Beeswing

I was nineteen when I came to town, they called it the Summer of Love
Burning babies, burning flags, the hawks against the doves
I took a job at the steamie way down on Cauldrum Street
And I fell in love with a laundry girl that was working next to me

Brown hair zig-zagged round her face and a look of half-surprise
Like a fox caught in the headlights, there was animal in her eyes
And she said to me "oh can't you see that I'm not the factory kind
If you don't take me out of here I'll lose my mind"

     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, she was running wild
     She said "So long as there's no price on love, I'll stay
     And you wouldn't want me any other way"

We busked around the market towns, fruit picking down in Kent
We could tinker pots and pans and knives wherever we went
We were camping down the Gower one time and the work was pretty good
She wouldn't wait for the harvest, I thought maybe we should

I said to her, "we'll settle down, we'll get a few acres dug
A fire burning in the hearth and babies on the rug"
And she said, "Oh love, you foolish thing, that surely sounds like hell
You might be lord of half the world, you'll not own me as well"

We were drinking more in those days and our tempers reached a pitch
Like a fool I let her go and she took the rambling itch
The last I heard she's living rough back on the Derby beat
A bottle of White Horse in her pocket, a wolfhound at her feet

And they say her rose is faded now
Rough weather and hard booze
Well maybe that's the price you pay
For the chains that you refuse

     She was a rare thing, fine as a bee's wing
     And I miss her more than ever words could say
     If I could just taste all of her wildness now
     If I could hold her in my arms today
     I wouldn't want her any other way

Richard Thompson, 1994. As sung by Grace Petrie.