It Must Have Been The Roses

Lyrics: Robert Hunter
Music: Robert Hunter

One of only two songs where the Dead played Robert Hunter's music as well as his lyrics.

Annie laid her head down in the roses
She had ribbons, ribbons, ribbons in her long brown hair
I don't know, maybe it was the roses
All I know, I could not leave her there

Chorus
I don't know, it must have been the roses
The roses or the ribbons in her long brown hair
I don't know, maybe it was the roses
All I know, I could not leave her there

Ten years the waves rolled the ships home from the sea
Thinking well how it may blow in all good company
If I tell another what your own lips told to me
Let me lay 'neath the roses and my eyes no longer see

[chorus]

One pane of glass in the window
No one is complaining, though, come in and shut the door
Faded is the crimson from the ribbons that she wore
And it's strange how no one comes round any more

[chorus]

"This is a song I wrote for a friend of mine, Butch Waller of High Country - a great bluegrass band [on the] West Coast. They never got around to doing it, [so] I finally recorded it myself [on my] first record."

My love is like a red, red rose
That's laid in summer bloom
My love is like a melody
That's sweetly play'd in tune
As fair art thou, my bonnie lass
So deep in love am I
And I will love thee still
Till all the seas gang dry

Till all the seas gang dry, my love
And the rocks melt wi' the sun
And I will love thee still, my dear
While the sands o' life shall run
And fare thee well, my own true luve,
And fare thee well a while
And I will come again my love
Tho' it were ten thousand mile