"Our Mother The Mountain" lyrics - TOWNES VAN ZANDT

My lover comes to me with a rose on her bosom
The moon's dancin' purple
All through her black hair
And a ladies-in-waiting she stands 'neath my window
And the sun will rise soon
On the false and the fair
Sing a-too a-loor-a-lie-o

She tells me she comes from my mother the mountain
Her skin fits her tightly
And her lips do not lie
She silently slips from her throat a medallion
Slowly she twirls it
In front of my eyes
Sing a-too a-loor-a-lie-o

I watch her, I love her, I long for to touch her
The satin she's wearin'
Is shimmering blue
Outside my window her ladies are sleeping
My dogs a gone hunting
The howling is through
Sing a-too a-loor-a-lie-o

So I reach for her hand and her eyes turn to poison
And her hair turns to splinters,
And her flesh turns to brine
She leaps across the room, she stands in the window
And screams that my first-born
Will surely be blind
Sing a-too a-loor-a-lie-o

Then she throws herself out to the black of the nightfall
She's parted her lips
But she makes not a sound
I fly down the stairway, and I run to the garden
No trace of my true love
Is there to be found
Sing a-too a-loor-a-lie-o

So walk these hills lightly, and watch who you're lovin'
By mother the mountain
I swear that it's true
And love not a woman with hair black as midnight
And a dress made of satin
All shimmering blue
Sing a-too a-loor-a-lie-o

Oh my lover comes to me with a rose on her bosom
The moon's dancing purple all through her black hair
And a lady's in waiting, she'll stand 'neath my window
And the sun will rise soon on the false and the fair