Desolation Row

They're selling postcards of the hanging

Where they're painting the passports brown

Yeah, the beauty parlor's filled with sailors

The circus is in town

Oh now but here comes the blind commissioner

Well, they got him in a trance

One hand is tied to the tight-rope walker

The other's 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

"Well, it takes one to know one," she smiles

And she puts her hands in her back pockets

Bette Davis style

Now but in comes Romeo moaning

"You belong to me I believe"

And someone says, "You're in the wrong place, my friend

You better leave"

And then only sound that's left

After the ambulances go

Is Cinderella sweeping up

On Desolation Row

Now at midnight all the agents

And super-human crew

Go out and round up everyone

That knows more than they do

They gonna bring 'em 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

Check to see that no one is escaping

To Desolation Row

'Cause right now I can't read too good

Don't send me no letters, no

Not unless you gotta mail them

From Desolation Row