Townes had several dark songs related to manic depression. Perhaps the darkest were:

Sanitarium blues

and

Kathleen

About the latter, his friend Chito, who also was bipolar and experienced the same treatment that Townes underwent at Galveston, said that Kathleen was 'the embodiment of the dark depths of manic depression'. He said: 'You don't know Kathleen, do you? Well I know her and Townes sure knew her. She's real and when you go down to see her, you're really going down ... You don't want to go but, on the other hand, you do want to go. You have to go, and there's comfort in that'.

Quoted in Robert Earl Hardy 'Deeper Blue: the life and music of Townes Van Zandt' p 85.

--Stewie.