East Of Woodstock, West Of Viet Nam Lyrics - Blood And Candle Smoke - Tom Russell

I slept through the Nineteen Sixties, I heard Dory Previn say 

But me I caught me the great white bird, to the shores of Africay 

Where I lost my adolescent heart, to the sound of a talking drum 

Yeah, East of Woodstock, West of Vietnam 

And on the roads outside Oshogbo, Lord I fell down on my knees 

There were female spirits in old mud huts, iron bells ringing up in the trees 

And an eighty-year-old white priest, she made juju all night long 

Yeah, East of Woodstock, West of Vietnam 

Raise high the roof beams carpenter boy, yeah were coming through the rye 

In the cinema I saw the man on the moon, I laughed so hard I cried 

It was somewhere in those rainy seasons, that I learned to carve my song 

Yeah, East of Woodstock, West of Vietnam 

Oh Africa, Mother Africa, you lay heavy on my breast 

You old cradle of civilization, heart of darkness blood and death 

Though we had to play you running scared, when the crocodile ate the sun 

Yeah, East of Woodstock, West of Vietnam 

Well I think its going to rain tonight, I can smell it coming off the sea 

As I sit here reading old Graham Greene I taste Africa on every page 

Then I close my eyes and see those red clay roads, and its sundown and boys Im gone 

Yeah, East of Woodstock, West of Vietnam 

Raise high the roof beams carpenter boy, yeah were coming through the rye 

It was a moveable feast of war and memory, a dark old lullaby 

It was the smoke of a thousand camp fires, it was the wrong end of a gun, 

Yeah, East of Woodstock, West of Vietnam. 

Yeah, East of Woodstock, West of Vietnam