"to tell sweet lies one last time"

The Annotated "To Lay Me Down"

An installment in The Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics.
By David Dodd
Kraemer Family Library, University of Colorado at Colorado Springs
"To Lay Me Down"
Words by Robert Hunter; music by Jerry Garcia
Copyright Ice Nine Publishing; used by permission

To lay me down
once more
To lay me down
with my head
in sparkling clover
Let the world go by
all lost in dreaming
To lay me down
one last time
To lay me down

To be with you
once more
To be with you
with our bodies
close together
Let the world go by
like clouds a-streaming
To lay me down
one last time
To lay me down

To lay me down
To lay me down
To lay me down
One last time
To lay me down

To lie with you
once more
to lie with you
with our dreams
entwined together
To lie beside you
my love still sleeping
to tell sweet lies
one last time
and say goodnight

to lay me down,
to lay me down
to lay me down
one last time
to lay me down
to lay me down
one last time
to lay me down

"To Lay Me Down"

Lyric written in London, 1970. According to an interview with Hunter in a documentary film by Jeremy Marre, "To Lay Me Down," "Brokedown Palace" and "Ripple" were all composed in one afternoon, over a half-bottle of retsina. (The film aired on VH-1 on April 16, 1997.)

Musical details:

Recorded on

Covered on Deadicated by The Cowboy Junkies.

First performance: July 30, 1970, at the Matrix, in San Francisco. "To Lay Me Down" opened the show, which consisted of one acoustic set. It was followed by "Dire Wolf". The song's subsequent performance history is fairly unusual among Dead tunes, dropping from the repertoire for 200-300 shows at a time several times.


Keywords: @love , @sleep, @dream
DeadBase code: TLAY
First posted: February 1, 1996
Last revised: April 18, 1997