Winter Song
Unreleased 1973
From their northeast source the sour wind roars
Bear gifts fresh from the valley waters
Hollow echoes strip Pennsylvania mountain walls
With their corsets and their old Betsy ruffle
And their slips with pearly white
They stand bulging up against the screen door
And bid you "good night"
Summer's sweet and she brings me water
But give me Winter, that old icy whore
While summer lies meek and follows orders
Winter cries "Me!" and pulls you through the door
The limp milk tramp cries metal flake tears
They drip like honey down soot mama's leg
You lay watchin' them off, eat a hole in his cloth
He'll ask, but he don't beg
Said I'd like to see the mademoiselle
Who holds the keys to all these doors around the waist
And rings the bell
Summer's sweet and she brings me water
But give me Winter, that old icy whore
Summer lies meek and follows orders
Winter cries "Me!" and pulls you through the door
With scufflin' sound the knot voiced matron makes her rounds
Knockin' on each and every door
With a look like white heat, she sways, salty, sweet
And leads me 'cross her Persian floor
She squeezed my hand and before her I stood
I was scared, it was dark but it was good
Summer's sweet and she brings me water
But give me Winter, that old icy whore
While summer lies meek and follows orders
Winter cries "Me!" and pulls you through the door
~Bruce Springsteen~
