At the general store on Friday night, you’ll find most half the town,
all waiting for the man to lead the old
blind fiddler down.
When he does, we form a circle as he sits down
in the middle,
and nestles to a weathered cheek, his battered,
worn out fiddle.
Then shadows from his misty past, the haunting
music brings,
when the old man takes the fiddle and draws the
bow across the strings.
You can hear a mother crooning to the boy child on her breast,
then laughing children playing, free from
every care and stress.
The sound of joyful wedding chimes, as organ music swells,
the joy soon turned to sadness by the toll of
funeral bells.
It’s the story of his lifetime that in the music
rings,
when the old man takes the fiddle and draws the
bow across the strings.
A deep-felt sense of sadness seems to linger in
the air,
it touches us all deeply, yet we are glad that
we are there.
For there’s breathless expectation as the blind man plays and sings,
like minstrels played in marble halls
before the thrones of kings.
For every life’s a blind man’s view of scenes
that memory bring,
when the old man takes the fiddle and draws the
bow across the strings.
The last song played was soft and low, like
rustling angel wings,
then he placed his fiddle on the ground and laid
the bow across the strings.
Don McAdam