Idiot Wind

Someone's got it in for me, they're planting stories in the press,

Whoever it is, I wish they'd cut it out quick, but when they will I can only guess.

They say I shot a man named Gray and took his wife to Italy,

She inherited a million bucks and, when she died, it came to me –

I can't help it if I'm lucky.

People see me all the time, I guess they just can't remember how to act,

Their minds are filled with false ideas, images, and distorted facts.

And even you, yesterday, you had to ask me where it was at,

I couldn't believe after all these years you didn't know me any better than that,

Sweet lady.

Idiot wind blowing every time you move your mouth,

Blowing on down the backroads, heading south,

Idiot wind blowing every time you move your teeth,

You're an idiot, babe, it's a wonder that you still know how to breathe.

I ran into the fortune-teller, she said beware 'cause of¹ lightning might strike,

I haven't known about peace and quiet now for so long I don't even remember what it's like.

There's a lone soldier on the cross, smoke pouring out of a boxcar door,

He didn't know it, he never thought it could be done, but in the final shot he'd won the war

After losing every battle.

I woke up on the roadside daydreaming 'bout the way things a-really are,

Visions of your smoking tone² shoot through my head and are making me see stars.

You hurt the ones that I love best, then cover up the truth with lies,

One day you'll be in the grave, flies buzzing around your eyes,

Blood on your saddle.

Idiot wind blowing through the flowers on your tomb,

Blowing through the curtains in your room,

Idiot wind blowing every time you move your mouth––teeth,

You're an idiot, babe, it's a wonder that you still can even breathe.

It was gravity which pulled us down and destiny which broke us apart,

You tamed the lion in my cage, but it wasn't enough to change my heart.

Now everything's a little upside down – as a matter of fact, the wheels have stopped,

What's good is bad, what's bad is good, you'll find out when you reach the top

You are on the bottom.

I noticed at the ceremony that your corrupt ways had finally made you blind,

I can't recall your face anymore, your mouth has changed and your eyes don't look into mine.

The priest wore black on the seventh day, sat stone-faced while the building burned,

I waited for you on the running boards near the cypress tree while the springtime turned

Slowly into autumn.

Idiot wind blowing like a circle around my skull,

From the Grand Coulee Dam to the Capitol,

Idiot wind blowing every time you move your teeth,

You're an idiot, babe, it's a wonder that you still know how to breathe.

I can't feel you anymore, I can't even touch the clothes you wear,

Every time I come into your door, you leave me standing in the middle of the air.

Down the highway, down the tracks, down the road to ecstasy,

I followed you beneath the stars, hounded by your memory

And all your raging glory.

I've been double-crossed now for the very last time and I think I finally see,

I kissed goodbye the howling beast on the borderline which separated you from me.

You'll never know the hurt I suffered, nor the pain I'd rise above

And I'll never know the same about you, your holiness, or your kind of love

And it makes me feel so sorry.

Idiot wind blowing through the buttons of our coat,

Blowing through the letters that we wrote,

Idiot wind blowing through the dust upon our shelves,

We're idiots, babe, it's a wonder we can even feed ourselves.

¹ Sic.

² It is difficult to tell exactly what Dylan sings here since it obviously differs from what he sings in the original album version of the song, "[v]isions of your chestnut mare..."