"Visions Of Johanna" lyrics
Ain't it just like the night to play
Tricks when you're trying to be quiet?
We all sit here stranded
We're all doing our best to deny it
And Louise holds a handful of rain, tempting you to defy it
Lights flicker from the opposite loft
In this room the heat pipes just cough
The country station plays soft
But there's nothing, really nothing to turn off
Just Louise and her lover so entwined
And these visions of Johanna that conquer my mind
In the empty lot where the ladies play
Blindman's bluff with the key chain
And the all-night girls
Whisper of escapades out on the "D" train
The night watchman click his flashlight
And wonders just who is insane
Louise, she's all right, she's just near
She's delicate and it seems like veneer
But she makes it concise and too clear
That Johanna's not here
The ghost of 'lectricity howls in the bones of her face
And these visions of Johanna have now taken my place
Oh, little boy lost, he takes himself seriously
He brags of his misery, he likes to live dangerously
And in bringing her name up
He speaks of a farewell kiss to me
He's sure got a lot of gall
To be so useless and all
Muttering small talk at the wall while I'm in the hall
Oh, how can I explain?
It's so hard to get on
And these visions of Johanna kept me up past the dawn
Inside the museum, Infinity goes up on trial
Voices echo, "So this is what salvation's like after a while"
Mona Lisa had the highway blues
You can tell by her smile
See the primitive wallflower freeze
And the jelly-faced women all sneeze
And the one with the mustache says, "Jeez, I can't find my knees"
Oh, jewels and binoculars hang from the head of a mule
These visions of Johanna make it all seem so cruel
Well, the peddler now speaks
To the countess who's pretending to care for him
He says, "Name me someone not a parasite
I'll go out and pray for him"
But like Louise always says
"You can't look at much, can you?"
As she, herself, prepares for him
My Madonna, she still has not showed
This empty cage now corrodes
Where her cape of the stage once had flowed
The fiddler now steps to the road
He writes all's been repaid that was owed
On the back of a fish truck that loads
While my conscience explodes
The harmonicas play the skeleton keys and the rain
And these visions of Johanna are now all that remain
Yes, these visions of Johanna are now all that remain
Tricks when you're trying to be quiet?
We all sit here stranded
We're all doing our best to deny it
And Louise holds a handful of rain, tempting you to defy it
Lights flicker from the opposite loft
In this room the heat pipes just cough
The country station plays soft
But there's nothing, really nothing to turn off
Just Louise and her lover so entwined
And these visions of Johanna that conquer my mind
In the empty lot where the ladies play
Blindman's bluff with the key chain
And the all-night girls
Whisper of escapades out on the "D" train
The night watchman click his flashlight
And wonders just who is insane
Louise, she's all right, she's just near
She's delicate and it seems like veneer
But she makes it concise and too clear
That Johanna's not here
The ghost of 'lectricity howls in the bones of her face
And these visions of Johanna have now taken my place
Oh, little boy lost, he takes himself seriously
He brags of his misery, he likes to live dangerously
And in bringing her name up
He speaks of a farewell kiss to me
He's sure got a lot of gall
To be so useless and all
Muttering small talk at the wall while I'm in the hall
Oh, how can I explain?
It's so hard to get on
And these visions of Johanna kept me up past the dawn
Inside the museum, Infinity goes up on trial
Voices echo, "So this is what salvation's like after a while"
Mona Lisa had the highway blues
You can tell by her smile
See the primitive wallflower freeze
And the jelly-faced women all sneeze
And the one with the mustache says, "Jeez, I can't find my knees"
Oh, jewels and binoculars hang from the head of a mule
These visions of Johanna make it all seem so cruel
Well, the peddler now speaks
To the countess who's pretending to care for him
He says, "Name me someone not a parasite
I'll go out and pray for him"
But like Louise always says
"You can't look at much, can you?"
As she, herself, prepares for him
My Madonna, she still has not showed
This empty cage now corrodes
Where her cape of the stage once had flowed
The fiddler now steps to the road
He writes all's been repaid that was owed
On the back of a fish truck that loads
While my conscience explodes
The harmonicas play the skeleton keys and the rain
And these visions of Johanna are now all that remain
Yes, these visions of Johanna are now all that remain
Writer(s): Bob Dylan
