[Verse 1]
I was nineteen when I came to town
They called it the Summer of Love
They were burning babies, burning flags
The hawks against the doves
I took a job in the steamie
Down on Cauldrum Street
I fell in love with a laundry girl
Who was working next to me

[Chorus]
She was a rare thing
Fine as a bee's wing
Oh, so fine a breath of wind might blow her away
She was a lost child
She was running wild
Said, "As long as there's no price on love, I'll stay
And you wouldn't want me any other way"

[Verse 2]
Brown hair zig-zaged around her face
And a look of half-surprise
Like a fox caught in the hеadlights
There was animal in her еyes
She said, "Young man, oh, can't you see
I'm not the factory kind
If you don't take me out of here
I'll surely lose my mind"
[Chorus]
She was a rare thing
Fine as a bee's wing
Oh, so fine that I might crush her where she lay
She was a lost child
She was running wild
Said, "As long as there's no price on love, I'll stay"
And I wouldn't want her any other way

[Verse 3]
So we busked around the market towns
We picked fruit down in Kent
We could tinker lamps and pots and pans
And knives wherever we went
And I said that we might settle down
And get a few acres dug
A fire burning in the hearth
And babies on the rug
She said, "Oh man, you foolish man
That surely sounds like hell
You might be lord to half the world
You'll not own me as well"

[Chorus]
She was a rare thing
Fine as a bee's wing
Oh, so fine a breath of wind might blow her away
She was a lost child
She was running wild
Said, "As long as there's no price on love, I'll stay
And you wouldn't want me any other way"
[Verse 4]
We were camping down the Gower one time
The work was pretty good
She thought we shouldn't wait for the frost
I thought maybe we should
We were drinking more in those days
And fevers reached a pitch
And like a fool, I let her run off
With the rambling itch
And last I heard, she's sleeping rough
Down on the Derby beat
White Horse in her hip pocket
And a wolfhound at her feet
And they say she even married once
A man named Romany Brown
But even a travelin' caravan
Was too much settling down
And they say her flower is faded now
Hard weather and hard booze
But maybe that's the price you pay
For the chains you refuse

[Chorus]
She was a rare thing
Fine as a bee's wing
And I miss her now more than words could say
If I could just taste
All of her wildness now
If I could hold her in my arms today
Then I wouldn't want her any other way