Desolation Row Songtext
von Grateful Dead

They′re selling postcards of the hanging
They're painting the passports brown
The beauty parlor is filled with sailors
The circus is in tow

Here comes the blind commissioner
They′ve got him in a trance
One hand is tied to the tight-rope walker
The other is in his pants

And the riot squad, they're restless
They need somewhere to go
As lady and I look out tonight
From Desolation Row

Cinderella, she seems so easy
"Takes one to know one," she smiles
Puts her hands in her back pockets
Bette Davis style


In walks Romeo, he's moaning
You belong to me, I believe
And someone says, You′re in the wrong place, my friend
You better leave

And the only sound you can hear
After the ambulances go is
Cinderella sweeping up
On Desolation Row

Now Ophelia, she′s neath the window
For her I feel so afraid
On her 22nd birthday
She already is an old maid

To her, death is quite romantic
She wears an iron vest
Her profession's her religion
Her sin is her lifelessness

And though her eyes are fixed upon Noah′s great rainbow
She spend her time peeking
On Desolation Row

Now Einstein disguised in Robin Hood
With his memories in a trunk
Passed this way an hour ago
With his friend, a jealous monk


He looked so immaculately frightful
As he bummed a cigarette
As he went off sniffing drainpipes and reciting the alphabet

Now you would not think to look at him
But he was famous long ago
For playing the electric violin
On Desolation Row

Dr. Filth, he keeps his world
Inside of a leather cup
But all his sexless patients
They're trying to blow it up

Now his nurse, some local loser
She′s in charge of the cyanide hole
And she also keeps the cards that reads
"Have mercy on his soul"

They all play on the penny whistles
As you can hear then blow
If you lean your head out far enough
From Desolation Row

Across the street, they've nailed the curtains
They′re getting ready for the feast
The Phantom of the Opera
In a perfect image of a priest

They are spoon-feeding Casanova
To get him to feel more assured
Then they'll kill him with self-confidence
After poisoning him with words

And the Phantom's shouting to skinny girls
"Get outta here if you don′t know
Casanova is just being punished for going
To Desolation Row"

At midnight all the agents
And the superhuman crew
Come out and round up everyone
That knows more than they do

Then they bring them to the factory
Where the heart attack machine
Is strapped across their shoulders
And then the kerosene

Is brought down from the castles
By insurance men who go
They make sure that nobody is escaping
To Desolation Row

Praise be to Nero′s Neptune
The Titanic sails at dawn
Everybody's shouting
"Which side are you on?"

And Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot
Fighting in the captain′s tower
While calypso singers laugh at them
As fishermen hold flowers

Between the windows of the sea
Where lovely mermaids flow
And no one has to think too much
About Desolation Row

Yes, I received your letter yesterday
About the time, the doorknob broke
When you asked me how I was doing
Was that some kinda joke?

All these people that you mention
Yes, I know them, they're quite lame
I had to rearrange their faces
And give them all another name

Right now, I can′t read so good
Don't count me, no more letters, no
Not unless you mail them
From Desolation Row