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The Whereabouts of His Forgotten Mistress

from Since You Been Gone by Sam Steffen

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lyrics

So you’ve finally made your peace with those you used to go ahead and make your wars with
I knew you had it in you babe to lay down your sword upon the shield you prayed and swore with
Tell me, can you name the thing it was that made you want to go and change your old ways for forever?
Were you makin adjustments just now when you saw me, or were you just trine to prove that you were clever?

Last we met as I recall you inquired of the whereabouts of your old lover
A man they called by many names and titles that changed as he roamed from one town into another
Your man I know I met one night though I admit it only was in passin
I asked him straight up who he was and like you said he would, he asked me who was askin

I said to take his pick of names, he could call me what he liked for all it mattered
He gestured to a curtain near a window the behind of which a mirror had been shattered
We were in the this hotel bar and seemed the only travelers there who needed restin
I could tell he crawled a thousand miles by his feeble face and the beggars rags he dressed in

For a time we spoke of nothing and only said the things that never needed sayin
Of how he never meant to leave but had to get back to fleein from the debts that needed payin
He said he sposed you’d sent me to find out what became of that widowed heart’s disaster
He said a thing to say to you I couldn’t hear over the thunder’s raging laughter

So now I’ve circled back to you, you know that you’re as hard to find as he is
I tried to trace the love you lost and all I got for clues are my own ideas
But what I still can’t figure out is why you want so bad to know he’s out of rations
As if to know he’d settled down and were fine somewhere were the worst thing you could imagine

I’ve crossed the deserts wild and come within an inch of the maw of the volcano
I’ve poured the legends tall and drunk them deep and know as well they never stay the same though
Been up and down and lost and found and run around back and forth all across the country
I’ve consumed what’s been presumed to be too much, stood up and still been hungry

Now I don’t mean to speak for you, for who am I but a lowly bounty hunter
I’ve been paid to make my way and find out what I can by the contract that I’m under
But if you could within your heart try to make a place that wasn’t such a prison
Perhaps you’d have no need of me and we could both of us just get back to livin

credits

from Since You Been Gone, released February 14, 2020

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Sam Steffen Boise, Idaho

Sam Steffen is a Pennsylvania-bred, Boise-based singer-songwriter whose songs are the torch-wood for a new generation of folk music that has learned from the best stuff in the tradition and aims in spite of everything to keep the human spirit alive and kicking. A versatile musician and skilled finger-picker, Sam is at heart a story-teller, and a prolific one. ... more

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