"All Along the Watchtower" as written by Bob Dylan
There must be some way out of here Said the joker to the thief There's too much confusion, I can't get no relief Businessmen, they drink my wine Plowmen dig my earth None of them along the line know what any of it is worth
No reason to get excited,the thief, he kindly spoke There are many here among us who feel that life is but a joke But you and I, we've been through that, and this is not our fate So let us not talk falsely now, the hour is getting late
All along the watchtower, princes kept the view While all the women came and went, barefoot servants, too
Outside in the distance a wildcat did growl Two riders were approaching, the wind began to howl
I just read this about the songs meaning.
"It's cool that a 35 year old song can still get people to think and more, to discuss meaning. That's the power of poetry. I've been listening to this song since 1968 and have a few thoughts. Back then Dylan was not writing or talking about Jesus at all, certainly not in any way that foreshadowed his conversion experience ten years later. But he had written poetry for a long time about the meaning of life and our dilemmas as thinking beings. What is there to believe in? What has real meaning? is there anyone we can trust? What is the risk of stepping outside the norms and commonplace meanings of things and looking at ourselves directly? This song, I think, borrows a mythical style and setting to set up the problem of meaninglessness in our existence. The two personalities are both outsiders, a joker who lacks conventional dignity and a thief who lacks conventional morality. They are outside of the walls of psychological safety, where the regular social order still holds, despite the threats from wolves and howling winds. I read these as metaphors for the psychological dangers one must face when throwing off easy explanations of life's meaning. One must be very brave to be outside those walls. But there is no going back once you have cast off conventions -"You and I, we've been through that, and this is not our fate, let us not talk falsely now the hour is getting late." This is a crisis, he's saying, a crisis of existence itself."
I did not write this but it speaks to me.I am outside of the walls of psychological safety. This is where I am residing and have be for quite a while
