Lyrics to
Brokedown Palace

This version of Brokedown Palace was released by Grateful Dead in 1970.

Our About Grateful Dead page at Decade Lyrics includes the lyrics for Brokedown Palace from 1970 as well as all of the other lyrics from Grateful Dead that we have in our lyrics database.

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Fare you well my honey
Fare you well my only true one
All the birds that were singing
Have flown except you alone

Goin to leave this Broke-down Palace
On my hands and my knees I will roll roll roll
Make myself a bed by the waterside
In my time – in my time – I will roll roll roll

In a bed, in a bed
by the waterside I will lay my head
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
to rock my soul

River gonna take me
Sing me sweet and sleepy
Sing me sweet and sleepy
all the way back back home
It’s a far gone lullaby
sung many years ago
Mama, Mama, many worlds I’ve come
since I first left home

Goin home, goin home
by the waterside I will rest my bones
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
to rock my soul

Goin to plant a weeping willow
On the banks green edge it will grow grow grow
Sing a lullaby beside the water
Lovers come and go – the river roll roll roll

Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
to rock my soul

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Grateful Dead has released many songs over the years besides Brokedown Palace. Grateful Dead released songs from 1967 to 1989 spanning across albums like The Grateful Dead, Anthem Of The Sun, Live / Dead, Aoxomoxoa, American Beauty, Workingman's Dead, Grateful Dead (Skull & Roses), Europe '72, History Of The Grateful Dead, Vol. 1 (Bear's Choice), Wake Of The Flood, Grateful Dead From The Mars Hotel, Blues For Allah, Steal Your Face, Terrapin Station, Shakedown Street, Go To Heaven, Reckoning, In The Dark, and Built To Last. Decade Lyrics has over lyrics & songs by Grateful Dead.

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About Lyrics and Brokedown Palace by Grateful Dead

The lyrics to Brokedown Palace are the words, verses and chorus for the song released by Grateful Dead in 1970. Elements of the lyrics to Brokedown Palace are both direct in meaning and also metaphorical with the real meanings of the song only known by Grateful Dead and any collaborating writers working on the lyrics for Brokedown Palace back when it was created.

Some people have an interest in the etymology behind words and phrases. You can take apart the lyrics to Brokedown Palace by Grateful Dead in a number of ways. The word "lyric" itself derives from the Latin word lyricus, with the actual English word lyrics applied to the definition "words set to music" listed in Stainer and Barrett's 1876 Dictionary of Musical Terms. Continuing the chain, the Latin word lyricus derives from the Greek word λυρικός or lyrikós. This somewhat means "poetry accompanied by the lyre" or "words set to music." You can easily see that by looking at the background of the word lyric, that the "lyrics to Brokedown Palace" means the words set to the music of Brokedown Palace, or poetry accompanied by the lyre played by Grateful Dead. The singular form "lyric" is still used to mean the complete words to a song. However, the singular form lyric is also commonly used to refer to a specific line (or phrase) within a song's lyrics. Hence, by this analysis of word structure, you could say that the lyric to Brokedown Palace and the lyrics to Brokedown Palace are both one and the same thing. None of this talk about the word Lyrics is really relevant to fans of Grateful Dead who came here looking just for the lyrics to Brokedown Palace, but we feel it is still fun to learn what's behind commonly used words and lyrics in songs.

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