627
By Mickey Hart and Robert Hunter

 The Banyan Tree
 
   Runnin down the muddy road
   A hundred miles from hope
   Dangling from a banyan tree
   I see a length of rope
   
   Behind me is a tiger
   And a killer with a knife
   One wants me for supper
   And the other wants my life
   
   I got no choice but to grab
   The rope and start to climb
   The situation here is such
   The choice was never mine
   
   Hand by hand I pull my body
   From the mucky ground
   Up into the sunshine
   Where the birds are flying round
   
   I just keep on climbing cause
   There's nothing else to do
   My hands are getting tired
   But my spirit pulls me through
   
   Don't know if the tree is high
   Or if the clouds are low
   Pretty soon I'm looking down
   A hundred miles below
   
   The Earth is spinning blue and green
   Beneath my dizzy eyes
   But I leave caution to the faint
   And reason to the wise
   
   I see another climber and
   I think it could be you
   Climbing up a length of rope
   Where stars come shining through
   
   Was it hope of freedom
   Or panic born of fear
   Sent you climbing for your life
   Up in the stratosphere?
   
   I got no fear of falling
   And I got no fear to fly
   I believe my soul will live
   Although my body die
   
   Maybe I am right in that
   And maybe I am wrong
   I just keep on climbing
   And sometimes I make a song
   
   This is not the way I chose
   The way has chosen me
   Dangling to the the muddy road
   Beneath the Banyan tree
.

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