Gentle On My Mind

It's knowing that your door is always open

and your path is free to walk
That makes me tend to leave my sleeping bag

rolled up and stashed behind your couch
And it's knowing I'm not shackled by forgotten words and bonds
And the ink stains that have dried upon some line
That keeps you in the back roads by the rivers of my mem'ry
That keeps you ever gentle on my mind
 
It's not clinging to the rocks and ivy planted

on their columns now that bind me
Or something that somebody said because

they thought we fit together walking
It's just knowing that the world will not be cursing or forgiving
When I walk along some railroad track and find
That you're moving on the back roads by the rivers of my mem'ry
And for hours you're just gentle on my mind
 
Though the wheat fields and the clotheslines
And the junkyards and the highways come between us
And some other woman's crying to her mother

 cause she turned and I was gone
I still might run in silence, tears of joy might stain my face
And the summer sun might burn me till I'm blind
But not to where I cannot see you walking on the back roads
By the rivers flowing gentle on my mind
 
I dip my cup of of soup back from a gurgling,

 crackling cauldron in some train yard
My beard a roughened coal pile

and a dirty hat pulled low across my face
Through cupped hands round a tin can

I pretend to hold you to my breast and find
That you're wavin' from the back roads by the rivers of my mem'ry
Ever smiling, ever gentle on my mind