In regards to the meaning of this song:
Before a live performance on the EP Five Stories Falling, Geoff states “It’s about the last time I went to visit my grandmother in Columbus, and I saw that she was dying and it was the last time I was going to see her. It is about realizing how young you are, but how quickly you can go.”
That’s the thing about Geoff and his sublime poetry, you think it’s about one thing, but really it’s about something entirely different. But the lyrics are still universal and omnipresent, ubiquitous, even. So relatable. That’s one thing I love about this band. I also love their live performances, raw energy and Geoff’s beautiful, imperfectly perfect vocals. His voice soothes my aching soul.
The guilty undertaker sighs
The lonesome organ grinder cries
The silver saxophones say I should refuse you
The cracked bells and washed-out horns
Blow into my face with scorn, but it's
Not that way, I wasn't born to lose you
I want you
I want you
I want you, so bad
Honey, I want you
The drunken politician leaps
Upon the street where mothers weep
And the saviors who are fast asleep, they wait for you
And I wait for them to interrupt
Me drinkin' from my broken cup
And ask me to open up the gate for you
I want you
I want you
Yes I want you, so bad
Honey, I want you
How all my fathers, they've gone down
True love they've been without it
But all their daughters put me down
'Cause I don't think about it
Well, I return to the Queen of Spades
And talk with my chambermaid
She knows that I'm not afraid to look at her
She is good to me and there's
Nothing she doesn't see
She knows where I'd like to be but it doesn't
Matter
I want you
I want you
Yes I want you, so bad
Honey, I want you
Now your dancing child with his Chinese suit he
Spoke to me, I took his flute
No, I wasn't very cute to him, was I?
But I did it, because he lied and
Because he took you for a ride
And because time was on his side and
Because I
Want you
I want you
Yes I want you, so bad
Honey, I want you
The lonesome organ grinder cries
The silver saxophones say I should refuse you
The cracked bells and washed-out horns
Blow into my face with scorn, but it's
Not that way, I wasn't born to lose you
I want you
I want you
I want you, so bad
Honey, I want you
The drunken politician leaps
Upon the street where mothers weep
And the saviors who are fast asleep, they wait for you
And I wait for them to interrupt
Me drinkin' from my broken cup
And ask me to open up the gate for you
I want you
I want you
Yes I want you, so bad
Honey, I want you
How all my fathers, they've gone down
True love they've been without it
But all their daughters put me down
'Cause I don't think about it
Well, I return to the Queen of Spades
And talk with my chambermaid
She knows that I'm not afraid to look at her
She is good to me and there's
Nothing she doesn't see
She knows where I'd like to be but it doesn't
Matter
I want you
I want you
Yes I want you, so bad
Honey, I want you
Now your dancing child with his Chinese suit he
Spoke to me, I took his flute
No, I wasn't very cute to him, was I?
But I did it, because he lied and
Because he took you for a ride
And because time was on his side and
Because I
Want you
I want you
Yes I want you, so bad
Honey, I want you
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I would like to explore that Dylan the Poet is talking about a larger theme of the 60s sexual revolution. I think the theme is "True Love is dead." The guilty undertaker (sexual revolution)signs that True Love is dead. The lonesome organ grinder is separated and gets no true love just a coin or two. The silver saxophones grease the music of bars and hook up scenes. The church bells and the wedding bells are cracked and the washed out horns are no longer triumphantly proclaimin true love.
The poet cannot accept it... it's not that way, I wasnt born into the generation in which true love died. I want you.. I want true love.
Drunken Politician leaps to his suicide in the street. No love for politicians. Mothers weep for children lost to the streets and the revolution. Saviours are sleeping but they would provide True Love. They expect me the poet to open the gate of true love again, but Dylan's cup is broken. He does not have true love and wants it so bad.
All my father's I feel refers to Dylan's poetical influences. The modernist poets disavow true love and embrace science and disdain the romantic poets. The daughter's of the sexual revolution are putting him down because he is romantically proclaiming that he wants True Love. They put him down because they are free, now from "True Love."
He moves down the social ladder to the Queen of Spades, maybe a bar or hotel, the chambermaid, the hotel room maid or the waitress. He is not afraid to look at her to see if she still believe in True Love. She understands and agrees about True Love. She knows that he wants True Love but he does not want it with her. The Queen of Spades could be a symbol of death. She wants true love but for him it would be death with the chambermaid. So, it does not matter because she is not part of the sexual revolutionaries.
Dancing child with His suit could be Cupid or Pan with his Pan flute. He is taking away Cupid's flute because he doesn't want just lust or to temporarily be in capricious love. He took away the flute and wasn't that cute to him.
He took away the lust flute and wants True Love. He wants the real thing.
This is just my humble opinion of what this poem is about. I dont claim to have anything other than my own point of view about this poem. I love this poem and most everything Bob Dylan wrote.
I think of him as a "Great" poet. Paul
@PDShimel So looking up the Queen of Spades, I see that it is a Hotel in London.<br /> <br /> <br /> <br />
@PDShimel So looking up the Queen of Spades, I see that it is a Hotel in London.<br /> <br /> <br /> <br />