My transcription from the recording on Spotify:


WHEN THE DINNER BELL RINGS
As sung by John Hartford on "Walls We Bounce Off Of" (1994)

When I look at this fiddle
The color of your skin
As smooth as the desert inside your eyes
Round as the world you profess not to be a part of

When I deal this card,
One of many that are capable of playing poker
Like the game we play with each other when we are alone
As a single mouse muffin on a new high-school diploma

So pulling back this lever
I start the engine like some diesel belt
From the basement of consciousness that controls my love of music
Which like my love of you shall not perish forever

And the best-loved songs of the American people, like the crowd
That dances in ever-widening circles
Around these fiddlers here who practice their sawmill movements
Changing only when the dinner bell rings


[My choice of where to put line breaks or stanza breaks is rather arbitrary. The song is just one long stream-of-consciousness. I notice he never quite finishes a sentence.]