Ain't talkin', just walkin'

I could have been someone....

Ain't talkin', just walkin'

Through this weary world of woe

Heart burnin', still yearnin'

No one on earth would ever know

If I'd had the time

My garden would shine with roses

My house would freshly sparkle

My books would be read

I might have been content

If I'd had the time

I would be fluent in every tongue

Well almost every (at least some)

I would remember jokes, and history,

You could ask me anything

I could have been someone

Well, so could anyone

So goes the song

Yes, so it goes.

If I'd had the time

It would not have been squandered

I would have studied, practised,

I could have been good at things

I might have got beyond Prelude IX

If I'd had the time

I'd have been better

As a friend, a father and a lover

I might even have earned respect

Perhaps people might have listened

Time would have been my friend, my brother,

Entwined in loved embracing

The days passing without regrets

Like migrating fieldfare, 

Ever to return

I could have been someone

Well, so could anyone

So goes the song

Yes, so it goes

But, I did have the time

But I used it all up

Well, almost all of it,

Now I just ask for a little more,

Where did it go?

I could have been someone

Well, so could anyone

So goes the song.

So, it goes.

Ain't talkin', just walkin'
Up the road, around the bend
Heart burnin', still yearnin'
In the last outback at the world's end

Bob Dylan

Ain't Talkin'

With thanks to Jem Finer and Shame MacGowan