(J. Hartford)

[Recorded November 12, 1968, Hollywod]



It's knowin' that your door is always open

And your path is free to walk

That makes me tend to leave my sleepin' bag

Rolled up and stashed behind your couch

And it's knowin' I'm not shackled

By forgotten words and bonds

And the ink stains that have dried upon some line

That keeps you in the back roads

By the rivers of my memory

That keeps you ever gentle on my mind



It's not clingin' to the rocks and ivy

Planted on their columns now that bind me

Or something that somebody said because

They thought we fit together walkin'

It's just knowing that the world

Will not be cursing or forgiving

When I walk along some railroad track and find

That you're movin' on the back roads



By the rivers of my memory

And for hours you're just gentle on my mind



Though the wheat fields and the clothes lines

And the junkyards and the highways come between us

And some other woman's cryin' to her mother

'cause she turned and I was gone

I still might run in silence

Tears of joy might stain my face

And the summer sun might burn me till I'm blind

But not to where I cannot see

You walkin' on the back roads

By the rivers flowin' gentle on my mind



I dip my cup of soup back from a gurglin' cracklin' cauldron

In some train yard

My beard a rustlin' coal pile

And a dirty hat pulled low across my face

Through cupped hands 'round a tin can

I pretend to hold you to my breast and find

That you're waitin' from the back roads

By the rivers of my memory

Ever smilin', ever gentle on my mind