I went walkin' out last summer
Tryin' to find a breath of air
I went walkin' on the mountain
A friend had told me I'd find you there

Went out walkin' through the wood the other day
And the world was a carpet laid before me
The buds were bursting and the air smelled sweet and strange
And it seemed about a hundred years ago

Mary and I, we would sit upon a gate
Just gazin' at some dragon in the sky
What tender days, we had no secrets hid away
Well, it seemed about a hundred years ago

Now all my friends are wearing worried smiles
Living out a dream of what they was
Don't you think it's sometimes wise not to grow up?

I won't grow up
I don't wanna go to school
Just to learn to be a puppet
And recite a silly rule

If growing up means it would be
Beneath my dignity to climb a tree
I won't grow up, won't grow up, won't grow up
Not me.

I stood stone-like at midnight suspended in my masquerade
I combed my hair till it was just right and commanded the night brigade
I was open to pain and crossed by the rain and I walked on a crooked crutch
I strolled all alone through a fallout zone and come out with my soul untouched
I hid in the clouded wrath of the crowd but when they said "Sit down," I stood up.

Ooh... growin’ up

Half a mile from the county fair
And the rain keep pourin' down
Me and Billy standin' there
With a silver half a crown
Hands are full of a fishin' rod
And the tackle on our backs
We just stood there gettin' wet
With our backs against the fence
Oh, the water
Oh, the water
Oh, the water
Hope it don't rain all day

And it stoned me to my soul
Stoned me just like Jelly Roll
And it stoned me
And it stoned me to my soul
Stoned me just like goin' home
And it stoned me

I got stoned and I missed it
I got stoned and I missed it
I got stoned and it rolled right by
I got stoned and I missed it
I got stoned and I missed it
I got stoned oh me oh my

Everyday in the week I'm in a different city
If I stay too long people try to pull me down
They talk about me like a dog
Talkin' about the clothes I wear
But they don't realize they're the ones who's square

Yeah!
And that's why
You can't hold me down
I don't want to be tied down I gotta move
Hey

I said
Stone free do what I please
Stone free to ride the breeze
Stone free, baby I can't stay
I got to got to got to get away
Yeah

The sweetest perfection
To call my own
The slightest correction
Couldn't finely hone
The sweetest infection
Of body and mind
The Sweetest injection
Of any kind

I stop and I stare too much
Afraid that I care too much
And I hardly dare to touch
For fear that the spell may be broken
When I need a drug in me
And it brings out the thug in me
Feel something tugging me
Then I want the real thing not tokens


Things you'd expect to be
Having effect on me
Pass undetectedly
But everyone knows what has got me
Takes me completely
Touches me sweetly
Reaches so deeply
I know that nothing can stop me

Going up to lousiana,
With a pool room key,
To see the beer drinking guru,
Who put a spell on me.

I got a spell on me!
I got a spell on me!
I got a Mississippi mud spell on me!
I got a spell on me!

You tell me you're lonely
I know how you feel
Leaning up at the bars
Rocking back on my heels
She's a wild bird who wandered
Too easy to stray
I knew she had to lose me
To find her own way
Oh, Corey, I'll be coming soon
Through the Louisiana pines to the Mississippi moon
Through the Louisiana pines to the Mississippi moon

The truth of love
an unsung song must tell
The course of love must follow blind
without a look behind
Rubin walked through the streets
of New Orleans 'till dawn,
Cerise so lightly in his arms
and her hair hung gently down

Riding on the City of New Orleans,
Illinois Central Monday morning rail
Fifteen cars and fifteen restless riders,
Three conductors and twenty-five sacks of mail.
All along the southbound odyssey
The train pulls out at Kankakee
Rolls along past houses, farms and fields.
Passin' trains that have no names,
Freight yards full of old black men
And the graveyards of the rusted automobiles.

Good morning America how are you?
Say, don't you know me I'm your native son,
I'm the train they call The City of New Orleans,
I'll be gone five hundred miles when the day is done.