I was eighteen when I came to town

They call it the Summer of Love

Burning babies, burning flags

The Hawks against the Doves

Well, I took a job at the Steamie

Way down on Cauldrum Street

And I fell in love with a laundry girl

She was working next to me

Brown hair zig-zagged round her face

The look of half-surprise

Like a fox caught in the headlights

There was animal in her eyes

Well, she said to me “Can’t you see

I’m not the factory kind and

If you don’t take me out of here

I’ll lose my mind.”

CHORUS

She was a rare thing

Fine as a beeswing

So fine a breath of wind might blow her away

She was a lost child

She was running wild, she said

“So long as there’s no price in love, I’ll stay

You wouldn’t want me any other way.”

We busked around the market towns

From picking down in Kent

We could tinker pots and pans

And knives wherever we went

We were camping around the Gower

And the work was pretty good

She wouldn’t wait for the harvest

I thought we should

Well I said to her we’ll settle down

We’ll get a few acres dug

With a fire burning in the hearth

And babies on the rug

She said “Now man, you foolish man

That surely sounds like hell

You might be lord of half the world

You’ll not own me as well.”

CHORUS

We were drinking more in those days

’Til our tempers reached a pitch

Like a fool I let her run away

When she took the rambling itch

At the last I’d heard she’s living rough

Back on Derby beat

With a bottle of White Horse in her pocket

And a wolfhound at her feet

Oh they say that she get married once

To a man named Romany Brown

But even a Gypsy caravan

Was too much like settling down

(Erin Boyle)

They say her rose is faded now

Rough weather and hard booze

But maybe that’s the price you pay

For the chains you refuse

(Both)

She was a rare thing

Fine as a beeswing

And I miss her more than ever words could say

If I could just taste

All of her wildness now

If I could hold her in my arms today

Then I wouldn’t want her any other way

If I could hold her in my arms today

I wouldn’t want her any other way