Lyrics to
Portobello Belle

This version of Portobello Belle was released by Dire Straits in 1979.

Our About Dire Straits page at Decade Lyrics includes the lyrics for Portobello Belle from 1979 as well as all of the other lyrics from Dire Straits that we have in our lyrics database.

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

Bella donna’s on the highstreet
Her breasts upon the off beat
And the stalls are just the side shows
Victoriano’s old clothes
And yes her jeans are tight now
She got to travel light now
She got to turn up all her roots now
She got to turn up for the boots now
She thinks she’s tough
She ain’t no English rose
But the blind singer
He’s seen enough and he knows
Do a song about a long gone Irish girl
But I got one for you Portobello Belle

She sees a man upon his back there
Escaping from a sack there
And Bella donna lingers
Her gloves aint got no fingers
The blind man says he Irish
He gets his money in a tin dish
Just a corner serinader
Upon a time he could of made her

She thinks she’s tough
She ain’t no English rose
But the blind singer
He’s seen enough and he knows
Do a song about a long gone Irish girl
But I got one for you Portobello Belle

This time a pair a boys are hawking
And the paraket is squawking
Upon a truck there is a wino
She get the crying off the wino
And then she here the raggy rumble
Bella donna is in the jungle
But she is no garden flower
There is no distress in the tower
Bella donna walks
Bella donna taking a stroll
She don’t care about your window box or your button hole
Sing a song about a long gone Irish girl
But I got one for you Portobello Belle

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Dire Straits has released many songs over the years besides Portobello Belle. Dire Straits released songs from 1978 to 1991 spanning across albums like Dire Straits, Communique, Making Movies, Love Over Gold, ExtendedancEPlay, Brothers In Arms, and On Every Street. Decade Lyrics has over lyrics & songs by Dire Straits.

If you're a fan of popular 1970s songs looking for more songs from 1979 or the 1970s overall, you've come to the right place!

About Lyrics and Portobello Belle by Dire Straits

The lyrics to Portobello Belle are just the words, phrases, verses and chorus that Dire Straits used when the song was created in 1979. The lyrics to Portobello Belle have both easy-to-spot meanings and hidden metaphors that have been discussed by the music press and fans, but only Dire Straits and any collaborators know all of the inspirations for the song.

If you like etymology or breaking apart phrases and words, it is easy to understand the lyrics to Portobello Belle by Dire Straits. 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 Portobello Belle" means the words set to the music of Portobello Belle, or poetry accompanied by the lyre played by Dire Straits. 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 Portobello Belle and the lyrics to Portobello Belle are both one and the same thing. None of this talk about the word Lyrics is really relevant to fans of Dire Straits who came here looking just for the lyrics to Portobello Belle, but we feel it is still fun to learn what's behind commonly used words and lyrics in songs.

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