Dead Songs in Depth
Topic 202: To Lay Me Down
To Lay Me Down
w: Hunter m: Garcia
AGDL: http://arts.ucsc.edu/gdead/agdl/tlay.html
LASF: http://www.whitegum.com/songfile/TOLAYMED.HTM
To Lay Me Down
Lyrics: Robert Hunter
Music: Jerry Garcia
Copyright Ice Nine Publishing; used by permission.
To lay me down once more, to lay me down
With my head in sparkling clover
Let the world go by, all lost in dreaming
To lay me down one last time, to lay me down
To be with you once more, to be with you
With our bodies close together
Let the world go by, like clouds a-streaming
To lay me down one last time, to lay me down
To lay me down, to lay me down
To lay me down one last time, to lay me down
To lie with you once more, to lie with you
With our dreams entwined together
To wake beside you, my love still sleeping
To tell sweet lies one last time and say goodnight
To lay me down, to lay me down
To lay me down one last time, to lay me down
From Hunter's liner notes for the re-issue of "Garcia" in the box set
"So Many Roads":
"'To Lay Me Down' was written a while before the others, on the same
day as the lyrics to 'Brokedown Palace' and 'Ripple' - the second day
of my first visit to England. I found myslef left alone in Alan Trist's
flat on Devonshire Terrace in West Kensington, with a supply of very
nice thick linen paper, sun shining brightly through the window,
Retsina wine at my elbow. The songs flowed like molten gold onto the
page and stand as written.
"The images for 'To Lay Me Down' were inspired at Hampstead Heath (the
original title to the song) the day before - lying on the grass and
clover on a day of swallowtailed clouds, across from Jack Straw's
Castle, reunited with the girlfriend of my youth after a long
separation."
[For those who don't know London, Jack Straw's Castle is a pub near
Hampstead Heath, named after the leader of the 1381 Peasant's Revolt]
Jeff Fermon writes:
"with my head in sparkling clover" is such an evocative line. the imagery is
such that although robert wrote these lines from his own experience and
imagination, i can't help but picture jerry laying in a field, the rim of his
glasses reflecting the sunlight and fluffy clouds on the lenses, a slight
grin beneath his beard and his hands folded upon his rising and falling
chest. just laying there, daydreaming, watching the clouds...one last time.
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