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Left Foot Poet Sep 2017
"Shelter From The Storm"

Bob Dylan


'Twas in another lifetime one of toil and blood
When blackness was a virtue, the road was full of mud
I came in from the wilderness a creature void of form
"Come in," she said,
"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

And if I pass this way again you can rest assured
I'll always do my best for her on that I give my word
In a world of steel-eyed death and men who are fighting to be warm
"Come in," she said,
"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

Not a word was spoke between us there was little risk involved
Everything up to that point had been left unresolved
Try imagining a place where it's always safe and warm
"Come in," she said,
"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

I was burned out from exhaustion buried in the hail
Poisoned in the bushes and blown out on the trail
Hunted like a crocodile ravaged in the corn
"Come in," she said,
"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

Suddenly I turned around and she was standing there
With silver bracelets on her wrists and flowers in her hair
She walked up to me so gracefully and took my crown of thorns
"Come in," she said,
"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

Now there's a wall between us something there's been lost
I took too much for granted, I got my signals crossed
Just to think that it all began on an uneventful morn
"Come in," she said,
"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

Well the deputy walks on hard nails and the preacher rides a mount
But nothing really matters much it's doom alone that counts
And the one-eyed undertaker he blows a futile horn
"Come in," she said,
"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

I've heard newborn babies wailing like a mourning dove
And old men with broken teeth stranded without love
Do I understand your question man, is it hopeless and forlorn?
"Come in," she said,
"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

In a little hilltop village they gambled for my clothes
I bargained for salvation and she gave me a lethal dose
I offered up my innocence, I got repaid with scorn
"Come in," she said,
"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

Well I'm living in a foreign country but I'm bound to cross the line
Beauty walks a razor's edge someday I'll make it mine
If I could only turn back the clock to when God and her were born
"Come in," she said,
"I'll give you shelter from the storm."
in our thots, as we shelter-in-our-place Fla. refugees
Nat Lipstadt Jan 2016
Shelter from the Storm
by Bob Dylan**

'Twas in another lifetime, one of toil and blood
When blackness was a virtue the road was full of mud
I came in from the wilderness, a creature void of form
Come in, she said
I'll give ya shelter from the storm

And if I pass this way again, you can rest assured
I'll always do my best for her, on that I give my word
In a world of steel-eyed death, and men who are fighting to be warm
Come in, she said
I'll give ya shelter from the storm

Not a word was spoke between us, there was little risk involved
Everything up to that point had been left unresolved
Try imagining a place where it's always safe and warm
Come in, she said
I'll give ya shelter from the storm

I was burned out from exhaustion, buried in the hail
Poisoned in the bushes an' blown out on the trail
Hunted like a crocodile, ravaged in the corn
Come in, she said
I'll give ya shelter from the storm

Suddenly I turned around and she was standin' there
With silver bracelets on her wrists and flowers in her hair
She walked up to me so gracefully and took my crown of thorns
Come in, she said
I'll give ya shelter from the storm

Now there's a wall between us, somethin' there's been lost
I took too much for granted, I got my signals crossed
Just to think that it all began on an uneventful morn
Come in, she said
I'll give ya shelter from the storm

Well, the deputy walks on hard nails and the preacher rides a mount
But nothing really matters much, it's doom alone that counts
And the one-eyed undertaker, he blows a futile horn
Come in, she said
I'll give ya shelter from the storm

I've heard newborn babies wailin' like a mournin' dove
And old men with broken teeth stranded without love
Do I understand your question, man, is it hopeless and forlorn
Come in, she said
I'll give ya shelter from the storm

In a little hilltop village, they gambled for my clothes
I bargained for salvation and she gave me a lethal dose
I offered up my innocence I got repaid with scorn
Come in, she said
I'll give ya shelter from the storm

Well, I'm livin' in a foreign country but I'm bound to cross the line
Beauty walks a razor's edge, someday I'll make it mine
If I could only turn back the clock to when God and her were born
Come in, she said
I'll give ya shelter from the storm
2:17 am
listening to the prophet, this one of many,
one eyed undertaker, blowing his futile  horn...
brandon nagley Jun 2015
I was in another lifetime one of toil and blood
When blackness was a virtue and the road was full of mud
I came in from the wilderness a creature void of form
"Come in" she said
"I'll give you shelter from the storm".

And if I pass this way again you can rest assured
I'll always do my best for her on that I give my word
In a world of steel-eyed death and men who are fighting to be warm
"Come in" she said
"I'll give you shelter from the storm".

Not a word was spoke between us there was little risk involved
Everything up to that point had been left unresolved
Try imagining a place where it's always safe and warm
"Come in" she said
"I'll give you shelter from the storm".

I was burned out from exhaustion buried in the hail
Poisoned in the bushes and blown out on the trail
Hunted like a crocodile ravaged in the corn
"Come in" she said
"I'll give you shelter from the storm".

Suddenly I turned around and she was standing there
With silver bracelets on her wrists and flowers in her hair
She walked up to me so gracefully and took my crown of thorns
"Come in" she said
"I'll give you shelter from the storm".

Now there's a wall between us something there's been lost
I took too much for granted got my signals crossed
Just to think that it all began on a long-forgotten morn
"Come in" she said
"I'll give you shelter from the storm".

Well the deputy walks on hard nails and the preacher rides a mount
But nothing really matters much it's doom alone that counts
And the one-eyed undertaker he blows a futile horn
"Come in" she said
"I'll give you shelter from the storm".
I've heard newborn babies wailing like a mourning dove
And old men with broken teeth stranded without love
Do I understand your question man is it hopeless and forlorn
"Come in" she said
"I'll give you shelter from the storm".

In a little hilltop village they gambled for my clothes
I bargained for salvation and they gave me a lethal dose
I offered up my innocence and got repaid with scorn
"Come in" she said
"I'll give you shelter from the storm".

Well I'm living in a foreign country but I'm bound to cross the line
Beauty walks a razor's edge someday I'll make it mine
If I could only turn back the clock to when God and her were born
"Come in" she said
"I'll give you shelter from the storm".
I really think of mi amour
When he sings the words
( come in she said, I'll give ya shelter from the storm.. As she's given me a home!! (): love it!!!
Shelter me,
shelter me with your love
let it pound in my heart
and make me feel alive

shelter me,
shelter me with your presence,
let it be my friend,  let it company me
whenever I feel lonely

shelter me,
shelter me with the look in your eyes
let it reach the bottom of my heart
and make me feel seen and found

shelter me,
shelter me with your words
let them float in my veins,let them float like liquid love
through each and every part of my body

So shelter me, my love,
shelter me with the idea of being loved by you
because that's really all that matters now,
now that everything else is lost.
NitaAnn Jun 2014
What do you need right now, Nita?*

Shelter from the storm...that’s what I would like right now, that’s what I need right now, dear therapist. Shelter from the storm.

I don’t doubt my determination to survive and yet here I am crying again. Crying and wishing for some GD shelter from the storm…the therapist does not question my commitment or desire to continue to work through this and someday come out on the other side. At least I don’t think he does.

I can’t find my safe place now…it was such a fragile structure to begin with, made of straw and easily blown away in a storm. But it did exist two years ago. It did. And for the first time in my life I felt understood, safe, ‘real’. My safe place was a place I could be angry and sad, and hopeless. A place I could ask for guidance in the midst of confusion; a place of encouragement and comfort. A place where I could find shelter from the storm.

But I can’t find it now! I feel like I am on the edge of tumbling into oblivion due to my own intransigence and inability to let the therapist back in.(or anybody) And I desperately need him tonight…shelter from the rain, stability in the wind, comfort in the thunder and lightning that is threatening me now.

And what is maddening to me is if the therapist walked up to me right now, with a stadium sized umbrella and said, “Nita, come in and I will give you shelter from the storm.” I still stand in the rain, wind and thunderstorm and decline his umbrella because of my fear he would just wrench it away before the storm was over.

So, here I sit, like a frightened child, on my own little island, surrounded by the storm, crying my eyes out over loss and betrayal…on an endless search for shelter from the storm.

Here I sit arguing with myself!

"Nita, you can't do it alone.  He wants to help you - take the **** umbrella!"  
"No!  I won't take it!  I don't need his **** umbrella!"  
"Fine! You stupid baby! Suffer by yourself then ~ stubborn little *****!"  
"I said take the umbrella!"


Messed up?  That does not even begin to cover it.
today I exist as a vapor then I am no more
some may equate logic for fear that brings nothing near
my chest is heavy and my pulse is setting in
yesterday was such an easy game we used to play
awe but then let's face it it's quite easier today
for I am not myself these day for all i know I might by two
there's room enough in store to view yet I'm in a bind
I'm likewise in a haze for who I am from scene to scene
yet luck's provision is preverse it seems to work more in reverse
if things are better they'll be worse in quite a while
hey penny, one penny, tri penny, three
nature seldom ever fails to most surprisingly provide an undisclosing posing side
at one's dismay one needs to pray

Shelter me in a newer way to begin
won't you help me my friend
through mountains of madness amidst all its sadness
we can dig deeper then ever before
lest I implore another opened door
getting caught up in the middle playing a game of second fiddle
most of life seems to be a riddle
Shelter me in through the storms of life
amidst each added spice as if were on a roller coaster
don't stop me now but I may need a lawyer
as we get a little older we can grow to succumb to the world's cloister
like a hen with a rooster gets your pets spayed and nuetered.
we are only here for a short time so sound the alarm

inside we hide behind four walls that seal
caught up in a fix in every hope as you hold your crucifix
there's danger up ahead yet we lie in bed in the walking dead
a face full of lead falling apart at the seams in the evil schemes
shelter me in so I can breath always got something up my sleeve
shadows block the vortex of the sun lit resolution
we are out searching for the latest solution
in barbed wire fences always second glances
we often will scamble as Felix was played by Tony Randall
its hard to handle living in a society that's blind you see
but as a poet friend I'm making sweet lasting memories
languished over the onslaught of feelings inside
your the tool of the government and industry to
its all a will for power nothing more lest I simply implore
the fate for so much more yet for what?

shelter me in out in the playing field of delegation as polticians embrace a resonable solution
in the newspaper as shelter lies dormant in its beckoning call
to the know it all out in his ivory tower its in the hour of power
bask in the vast expanse between space and time
John Lennon said it best, "Happiness is a lone gun momma bang bang shoot shoot".
we got thick headed polticians that can't even reason
suicide is on the rise people are running away to hide
abortion on demand when will we ever live to understand
no one has a voice anymore no one understands
until today we got every good reason to bow our heads to pray
a mass hysteria in our land as we text our way through the day
no one breaks bread anymore no one bothers to pray
yet it ought not be this way on some sorted time delay
you still make fun of the gay instead of embracing them as they are our family
lines being drawn in the sand when will we ever live to understand

Shelter me in my friend with whom I can depend people are making choices
there maybe something blowing in the wind for Dylan was right on that one
building bridges that go across party lines in their most unique affliation
philosophically filled up with sullen brevity and everything that does the heavy deed
we often will hide behind the false hidden garb of compromise taking heed to twisted lies
Shelter me in so that I may live it all over once again my dearly beloved friend may you understand.
Where Shelter Jul 2023
Where Is Shelter?

depends on the location of the storm…

so oft have I queried the gods and you?

Where is Shelter?

to which, my response, while surrounded so well (!)
within
my moated island circumferences redoubt,
always was a simple:

“Here, Here is shelter!

But so human, thus so prone to delimited vision,
always, we scan the skies outward, fearful of
the hurricane and storm that approach,
from without, appearing, and the brewing
sky’s danger is visceral~visible to the naked eyes,
when,
it is disguised within the chambers of the
body, festering, until it is pestering, and
shelter, sadly, is not injectable, transferable,
easy remedial, and the hunkering down
with four walls not the solution, for the walls
themselves are damaged by decades of
waves of innocuous gently lapping that
still
erode igneous granite(1) and fissure the self,
this secretive, enemy insidious…


so it comes to be, that my own daggers have
pivoted, the pointy dangers pointed outwards,
well entrenched in their own defenses, now targeting
the whole of me, my outer walls breached, and
fired upon by cannons of cells, a treacherous
attack, bombardement par l'artillerie et les drones,
of the Fifth Column (2)…

so once more, say no more, but ask the brief of demand,

Where is Shelter?

the answer is as of yet to be decided,
but the forces
arrayed for and against
are equally determined!

W.S.
https://hellopoetry.com/poem/3094276/the-unthinkable-is-our-specialty/

(1)
Granite is hard enough to resist abrasion, strong enough to bear significant weight, inert enough to resist weathering,

(2)
Clandestine fifth column activities can involve acts of sabotage, disinformation, espionage, and/or terrorism executed within defense lines by secret sympathizers with an external force
MD  Aug 2010
Sweetness
MD Aug 2010
The sweetness hurt the most.
the way you laughed with me
the way we'd stay on the phone for hours
depicting scenes of us
having picnics on warm summer days
playing with our son
the one you swore you'd have with me
you swore a lot of things
but yet, you never swear.
well, you do now, but
you didn't used too.  that was sweet.
the sweetness hurt the most.
the way you'd lovingly ask me to hold you
i called you my baby girl, and you called me
every night, so that you could feel safe and warm
throughout our years together, I was your shelter
your safe haven, from the downpour that was his death
the hurricane winds that was another's misplaced love
and the lightning stress of a senior year, and big changes.
I protected you. I kept you safe. I loved you.
You used me.
and when you were done, when the storms had passed
you left my shelter, for one that looked better.
I warned you, my shelter was true and his was not,
I warned you, as sweetly as I could those hard nights
not to do this.
The sweetness hurt the most.
worse even, then when you ignored me
and left my shelter anyways, to go to his.
how did that work out?
you hate him now? he took advantage of you? he wasn't what you thought?
pity, because I tried to warn you,
whispering
"please listen to me, my sweet, i love you"
certainly
the sweetness hurt the most.
and even now, after everything you've told me after you finally
worked up the courage to face what you did
I know in my heart that you still have never felt the pain
even on your worst day,
that I felt on my best day, after you left.
you are somehow blessed with the ability to forget the things
you no longer wish to remember.  it's impossible to grow, until you feel the pain of what you've done
and as wrong as you were,
you were right about one thing, I am the strong one.
and my shelter? Now I have someone else to protect, and
there's no room for you.  and the songs I used to sing you to sleep with
the ones that I couldn't bare to hear after you left?
I sing them to her now, even more sweetly then I did to you.
the sweetness hurt the most.
but now I'm better, and I've let you go. I bear you no ill will.
I will never forget you, but forgiving you is a long shot too.
I do not hate you, nor even do I dislike you.
Count me not as your enemy, nor as your friend
Perhaps just do what you did before,
and forget to count me at all.
I may even still love you, but never enough to let you back in my shelter.  The shelter
that if truth be told, is the strongest one you could have found.
and god help you when the rain comes
because baby, my sweet, sweet girl
the rain will be my tear drops,
the wind will be the loving words i whispered to you,
and the lightning will be hot, flashing images of the future you gave up.  
and the sweetness will hurt the most.
Madeleine Wolf Jun 2018
Boy, it’s been hard.
It feels like I’ve
Been treading on glass.
Help me extract
This sharp shard,
And gimme shelter.

Boy, it’s been so long,
Since I’ve been
Held by my man.
I’ve been singing
A lonely, sad song,
And I need shelter.

Boy, can’t you see,
What this life
Has done to me?
I’ve cried many tears,
And I need to break free.
Please, gimme shelter.

Boy, I need someone
Who can reach out,
And can see the hurt
That’s been done.
Someone who is kind enough
To gimme shelter.

Boy, please say
That this pain,
And discomfort
Will go away.
Please stay,
And gimme shelter.

Gimme shelter.

— The End —