Some of the old folk singers used to phrase things in an interesting way, and then, I got my style from seeing a lot of outdoor-type poets, who would recite their poetry. When you don't have a guitar, you recite things differently, and there used to be quite a few poets in the jazz clubs, who would recite with a different type of attitude.

There is a house in New Orleans they call the Rising Sun, and it's been the ruin of many a poor boy and God I know I'm one.

You five and ten cent women with nothing in your heads, I got a real gal I'm loving and Lord I'll love her 'til I'm dead.

You call yourself what you want to call yourself. This is the land of the free.

Bent out of shape from society's pliers, cares not to come up any higher, but rather get you down in the hole that he's in.

...don't criticize what you can't understand, your sons and your daughters are beyond your command.

How many roads must a man walk down, Before you call him a man? How many seas must a white dove sail, Before she sleeps in the sand? Yes, and how many times must the cannon balls fly, Before they're forever banned?