All of my friends come to see me last night
I was laying in my bed and dying
Annie Beauneu from Saint Angel2
say, “The weather down here so fine”
Just then the wind
came squalling through the door
but who can
the weather command?
Just want to have
a little peace to die
and a friend or two
I love at hand
Fever roll up to a hundred and five
Roll on up
gonna roll back down
One more day
I find myself alive
tomorrow
maybe go
beneath the ground
See here how everything
lead up to this day
and it’s just like
any other day
that’s ever been3
Sun goin’ up
and then the
sun it goin’ down
Shine through my window and
my friends they come around
come around
People may know but
the people don’t care
that a man could be
as poor as me
“Take a look at poor Peter
he’s lyin’ in pain
now let’s go run
and see”
Run and see
hey, hey,
run and see
Words by Robert Hunter
Music by Jerry Garcia
Black Peter is the traditional counterpart to Saint Nicholas. In the Netherlands, Saint Nick “is accompanied by Spanish blackamoor servants in medieval costumes. They are called Black Peters and carry bundles of switches to beat naughty children.” (Folklore of World Holidays)
Compare the Arthur Conan Doyle story “The Adventure of Black Peter,” from The Return of Sherlock Holmes.
Compare also a character “the keeper of the moat”) in The Once and Future King by T. H. White.
And finally, there’s a 1963 movie by Czech director Milos Forman.
This seems to be a mythical place, perhaps near Fennario. The closest geographical name is San Angelo, Texas.
Seneca: “Nihil interesse inter diem et saeculum.” “A day differs not a whit from eternity,” from Epistulae ad Lucilium.
and Thomas Carlyle:
The poorest day that passes over us is the conflux of two eternities; it is made up of currents that issue from the remotest Past, and flow onwards to the remotest Future.
—Signs of the Times
The character Hamm in Samuel Beckett’s Endgame at one point refers to the day of his death as “a day like any other day.”
Studio recording: Workingman’s Dead (May 1970).
First documented performance: December 4, 1969, at the Fillmore West in San Francisco. It remained in the repertoire thereafter.
Patti Smith performed the song live in the days immediately following Garcia’s death.