Lyrics to
Ophelia

This version of Ophelia was released by The Band in 1975.

Our Decade Lyrics The Band profile has all of the Ophelia lyrics from 1975 and many more songs from the The Band discography that we have on file.

Here's more interesting things in songs and lyrics tied to The Band or about the 1970s in general.

Boards on the window, mail by the door
What would anybody leave so quickly for?
Ophelia – Where have you gone?

The old neighborhood just ain’t the same
Nobody knows just what became of
Ophelia – tell me, what went wrong?

Was it somethin’ that somebody said?
Mama, I know we broke the rules
Was somebody up against the law?
Honey, you know I’d die for you

Ashes of laughter, the coast is clear
Why do the best things always disappear
Like Ophelia – please darken my door

Was it somethin’ that somebody said?
Honey, you know we broke the rules
Was somebody up against the law?
Honey, you know I’d die for you

They got your number, scared and runnin’
But I’m still waitin’ for the second comin’
Of Ophelia – come back home

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The Band has released many songs over the years besides Ophelia. The Band released songs from 1968 to 2002 spanning across albums like Music From Big Pink, The Band, Stage Fright, Cahoots, Moondog Matinee, Northern Lights - Southern Cross, Islands, Jericho, High On The Hog, Jubilation, and The Last Waltz. Decade Lyrics has over lyrics & songs by The Band.

If you're a fan of popular 1970s songs looking for more songs from 1975 or the 1970s overall, you've come to the right place!

About Lyrics and Ophelia by The Band

When you decide to study the lyrics to Ophelia, you're looking at the words, verses and background chorus from the 1975 song by The Band. Some of the lyrics to Ophelia have clear meanings and some contain metaphorical references. Like most songs, only The Band and their collaborators know the full story behind any of the their songs.

You can understand the lyrics to Ophelia if you take apart the structure of the words. 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 Ophelia" means the words set to the music of Ophelia, or poetry accompanied by the lyre played by The Band. 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 Ophelia and the lyrics to Ophelia are both one and the same thing. None of this talk about the word Lyrics is really relevant to fans of The Band who came here looking just for the lyrics to Ophelia, but we feel it is still fun to learn what's behind commonly used words and lyrics in songs.

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