Blue Wing

He had a blue wing tattooed on his shoulder
 Well, it might have been a blue bird, I don't know
 But he gets stone drunk and talks about Alaska
 The salmon boats and 45 below
 He said he got that blue wing out in Walla Walla
 And his cellmate there was Little Willy John
 Oh, and Willy he was once a great blues singer
 Yeah, and winging Willy wrote him up a song
 He said it's dark in here, I can't see the sky
 But I look at this blue wing and I close my eyes
 And I fly away beyond these walls
 Up above the clouds where the rain don't fall
 On a poor man's dreams
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 They paroled Blue Wing in August of 1963
 And he moved North picking apples to the town of Wenatchee
 Then winter finally caught him in a run-down trailer park
 On the south side of Seattle where the days grow gray and dark
 Well, he drank and he dreamt of visions
 Where the salmon still ran free
 And his fathers, fathers crossed that
 Wide and wild old Bering Sea
 And the land belonged to everyone
 And there were old songs yet to sing
 Now it's narrowed down to a cheap hotel
 And a tattooed prison wing
 It's dark in here, I can't see the sky
 But I look at this blue wing and I close my eyes
 And I fly away beyond these walls
 Up above the clouds where the rain don't fall
 On a poor man's dreams
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 Well, he drank his way to LA, and that's where he died
 And nobody knew his Christian name and there was no one there to cry
 But I dreamt there was a funeral, a preacher and a cheap pine box
 And half way through the service, that Blue Wing began to talk
 Said it's dark in here, I can't see the sky
 But I look at this blue wing and I close my eyes
 And I fly away beyond these walls
 Up above the clouds where the rain don't fall
 On a poor man's dreams
 On a poor man's dreams
 On a poor man's dreams