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ADD: Don't Let Me Come Home a Stranger (Williams)

05 Dec 00 - 05:15 PM (#351962)
Subject: Don't Let Me Come Home a Stranger
From: Knicke

O.K. This song has been banging around in the back of my mind for quite some time. I don't know who sang it, nor what it's called, nor any of the lyrics except the chorus:

Will there come a time When the memories fade And pass on with the long, long years When the tie no longer binds Lord save me from this darkest fear Don't let me come home a stranger I couldn't stand to be a stranger

If anyone knows anything about this...please point me in the right direction!

Knicke

05 Dec 00 - 05:26 PM (#351966)
Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Don't Let Me Come Home a Stranger
From: Anglo

It's from Robin & Linda Williams, and I think you have the title right. I don't have a recording, sorry.

05 Dec 00 - 05:49 PM (#351978)
Subject: Lyr Add: DON'T LET ME COME HOME A STRANGER
From: Greyeyes

DON'T LET ME COME HOME A STRANGER
(R. Williams, J. Clark)


As I walked out one evening to breathe the air and sooth my mind
I thought of friends and the home I had and all the things I left behind

As silent stars shone on me, my eyes sought the far horizon
As if to pierce this veil of time, and escape this earthly prison

CHORUS:
Will there come a time when the memories fade
And pass on with the long, long years?
When the ties no longer bind. Lord save me from this darkest fear
Don't Let Me Come Home A Stranger
I couldn't stand to be a stranger

In this place so far from home, they know my name but they don't know me
They hear my voice, they see my face; but they can lay no claim on me

CHORUS:

As I walk this universe, I free my mind of time and space
I wander through the galaxies but never do I find my place

CHORUS:

05 Dec 00 - 05:57 PM (#351980)
Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Don't Let Me Come Home a Stranger
From: Greyeyes

I should have included a link to this site

22 Mar 17 - 04:08 PM (#3846187)
Subject: RE: ADD: Don't Let Me Come Home a Stranger (Williams)
From: Gabriel

There are fine recordings of this song by The Albion Band, Mary Black and Damien O'Kane.

23 Mar 17 - 01:45 AM (#3846225)
Subject: RE: ADD: Don't Let Me Come Home a Stranger (Williams)
From: GUEST,Tinker from Chicago

I know this wasn't the author's intent, but when I hear this song I think of the person trapped inside of Alzheimer's disease.

23 Mar 17 - 02:15 PM (#3846340)
Subject: RE: ADD: Don't Let Me Come Home a Stranger (Williams)
From: GUEST,henryp

Another great song from Robin Williams and Jerome Clarke;

They All Faded Away.

23 Mar 17 - 08:13 PM (#3846388)
Subject: RE: ADD: Don't Let Me Come Home a Stranger (Williams)
From: GUEST,Jerome Clark

Robin Williams, who is still a good friend, and I wrote this song in 1978 or 1979 in my living room. I had moved to the Chicago area to take a job as a magazine editor, and I was deathly homesick for old comrades and familiar scenes. Robin & Linda were visiting. I don't recall whether I wrote the lyrics then and there, or if I had them waiting for them on their arrival. I do remember that the idea evolved from the opening line, quoted from any number of old folk songs, "As I walked out one evening...." The melody is Robin's.

People bring their varying interpretations to the song, and they're all valid as far as I'm concerned. The late Art Thieme told me he had always heard it as a song about Alzheimer's. When he said as much, I was taken aback but soon saw what he meant. The moral of the story is that one can be surprised even by one's own words.

"They All Faded Away," which came along a few years later, was one of the world's gazillions of divorce-inspired songs. This one is accurate in all its details. Thanks for mentioning it -- it is still among my favorites of those the Williamses and I wrote together -- but my last name is Clark, not "Clarke."