The Gypsy and the Wolf

(This song, which features in the Last Wolf show, is based upon a European gypsy legend. It's put together like a film - I see it as an animation - with points of view switching every couple of verses between the two protagonists.)

There was an old gypsy, battered and worn,
He used to be known as a fighting man.
Now his fighting days were done -
He was knocked around like an old tin can.
So terrible was his trashed-up face,
When the gypsy stepped outside
Young men laughed and children screamed
And women in silent pity cried.

He had no family, had no friends,
Had no kids, had no wife,
So he took to the woods, the deep, dark woods
To live alone, a hermit's life.
He found a place beside a burn
Where only the beasts of the forest go,
And he built a shack with his bare hands
Before the fall of the winter snow.

There was an old wolf, tattered and torn,
He used to run with a life-long mate
But the hunters came, stole her pelt,
The old wolf's heart was filled with hate.
He became a killer among the flocks
He was hunted high, hunted low
So he took to the woods, the deep, dark woods
Before the fall of the winter snow.

Scent of stew from a cooking pot,
Curl of smoke from a chimney stack,
The old wolf came to the heart of the wood,
A muttering stream and a wooden shack.
Eyes lit up like amber stars
The old wolf heard a screech owl cry.
A lamp was lit in the wooden shack
And winter snow fell from the sky.

The gypsy sat beside his fire
And a bubbling pot of rabbit stew.
Out in the night a screech owl called
And the snows of cold November flew.
He listened close and cocked his head,
Another sound came creeping through -
Scritch, scritch scratch at the cabin door
Of goblin, ghost, or boogaboo.

But the gypsy was a fighting man
and the Devil himself couldn't give him a fright.
He spat in the fire, crossed the floor
Opened the door on a deep, dark night.
Snow and silence all around,
The gypsy shakes his head and sighs,
Then a big grey wolf steps into the shack
Stares at the gypsy with amber eyes

There in the middle of the wood, the deep, dark wood
Two old fighters, head to head.
Hard to say, if flesh met fur
Which of the two would wind up dead.
The gypsy goes to the cooking pot,
Fills a dish with steaming meat,
Lays it down upon the boards -
The old wolf bows his head to eat.

A traveller came from a distant land
Bearing the news of a terrible place;
A haunted stream and a wooden shack,
A demon with a trashed-up face.
But there was more to the traveller's tale
More to his story, more to tell;
The demon ran with a great grey wolf
Whose eyes burned out like the fires of hell -
They must have been the fires of hell

There was an old gypsy, battered and worn
He used to be known as a fighting man,
Then he took to the woods, the deep, dark woods
And that is how my tale began...