I met a friend of spirit
He drunk [Incomprehensible]
As I sat before his sanity
I was holding back from cryingHe saw my complications
And he mirrored me back simplified
And we laughed how our perfection
Would always be deniedHeart and humor and humility
He said, "Will lighten up your heavy load"
And they send me then to the refuge of the roadsI fell in with some drifters
Cast upon a beach town
Winn Dixie cold cuts
And highway hand me downsAnd I wound up fixing dinner
For them and Boston Jim
I well up with affection
Thinking back down the roads to thenThe nets were overflowing
In the Gulf of Mexico
They were overflowing in the refuge of the roadsThere was spring along the ditches
There were good times in the cities
Oh, radiant happiness
It was all so light and easy'Til I started analyzing
And I brought on my old ways
A thunderhead of judgment was
Gathering in my gazeAnd it made most people nervous
They just didn't want to know
What I was seeing in the refuge of the roadsI pulled off into a forest
Crickets clicking in the ferns
Like a wheel of fortune
I heard my fate turn, turn turnAnd I went running down a white sand road
I was running like a white-assed deer
Running to lose the blues
To the innocence in hereThese are the clouds of Michelangelo
Muscular with Gods and sun gold
Shine on your witness in the refuge in the roadsIn a highway service station
Over the month of June
Was a photograph of the earth
Taken coming back from the moonAnd you couldn't see a city
On that marbled bowling ball
Or a forest or a highway
Or me here least of allYou couldn't see these cold water restrooms
Or this baggage overload
Westbound and rolling taking refuge in the roads