Christabel - Robert Earl Keen

It’s been seven long days and seven hard nights

In a '62 Chevy with broke taillights

An east-bound man in a west-bound lane

A dishwater blonde about sixteen

Was standing on the shoulder with a ribbon in her hair

Her hand on her hip and her thumb in the air

And I pulled off the road and as she grabbed for the door

I knew the wind was cold 'cause I’d seen it all before

And I was scared

Things ain’t never what they seem

When you find you livin' in your own dream

Now the moonlight peeked in and out behind the clouds

Now and again on this godless child

And the radio was scrambed, cracklin' in the air

The ribbon she wore looked old in her hair

And I saw the moonlight sliver dead down on her face

I knew it was true, she was in the wrong place

In the wrong time, in the wrong tale

I knew when I’d asked her she’d hiss, «Christabel»

Things ain’t never what they seem

When you find you livin' in your own dream

She was after the man who had left her alone

With no father beside her and love longtime gone

And the snake deep inside her, a hiss in her head

The rest that had been her was dying or dead

And she’d a taste for young women with pearly white skin

She spat on the floor when she spoke of the man

Who made her like this, who had written her tale

This medieval maid they called «Christabel»

Things ain’t never what they seem

When you find you livin' in your own dream

Then she breathed out the story of her lover-to-be

A knight shining armor on a silvery steed

Who longed to be worthy so he sought the crusade

While she waited, breath bated, in linen brocade

But a pair of black eyes wove 'round her a spell

The snake they call Lydia seduced Christabel

And she cuddled her tender, she poisoned her soul

She stole her young body and made it her own

Things ain’t never what they seem

When you find you livin' in your own dream

Now the knight would love Lydia in Christabel’s arms

And Lydia would have it should he ever return

But Lydia was left with the story undone

No silvery steed, no castle, no throne

Half-woman, half-serpent entwined in a spell

A barge black and fancy this medieval tale

And she faded at dawning, the bird and the beast

Deep in the dreams of those bound for the east

Like me

Things ain’t never what they seem

When you find you livin' in your own dream

Things ain’t never what they seem