Dylan on a Sheridan Square bench in the West Village, New York, N.Y., Jan. 22, 1965. Photo by Fred. W. McDarrah/Getty Images, as also with the one below.
My adoration of Bob Dylan 1965-66 is akin to what rowdy religious types have for crucifixions and blue-eyed saviors, upward-mobility reincarnations and a heaven tripping over itself with willing young virgins. Ye of brandished belief may doubt my unbridled devotion, maintaining that spiritual exaltation cannot possibly be so unpreposterous. But I careth not. Also, doubt be a weasel of a thing, the cantankerous flipside of faith, so careful there, pilgrim.
But never mind that, as fellow Dylan fan HST was fond of saying. The writing from that unparalleled two-year genius-dump, twitching forth like some word-electrified corpse from the cave of the American unconscious, to transubstantiate into the Holy Trinity of Bob (BIABH/Highway 61/BoB, along with outtakes from those sessions), has never been approached, much less equaled. It’s for damn good reason Zimbo landed a Nobel in 2016.
What makes Dylan more than just one more meter-master rhyming raconteur isn’t just his subject matter and scope, but his astonishing imagery, thrown off like strands of cheap Mardi Gras beads in the presence of proudly bared hoo-hahs.
We all have our favorite nuggets – my great pal Joe is a “Grandpa died last week / Now he’s buried in the rocks” guy – we proud legions of Bob. And yes, I do pray to him sometimes.
OK, not really.
OK, maybe I do. Because why not?
One particular set of lyrics has haunted me, from the first time I heard it back in my middle teens, back when I still believed I understood anything. Because even removed from the context of its transcendent BIABH song, it is startling and stark, just raw poetry:
“Yonder stands your orphan with his gun / Crying like a fire in the sun.”
I’m just, wow.
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