Johnny Cash: If You Could Read My Mind

Tabbed by 
Eyolf Østrem

Written by Gordon Lightfoot
Stunningly performed by Johnny Cash on American Recordings V: A Hundred Highways (2006)
Tabbed by Eyolf Østrem

Chords:

Eadd9      0xx9-11-90 (or just plain E)
Dadd9      xx0970
A          x07655 or 577655
Bsus2      x24422
C#sus2     x46644
G#m7       464444
F#m7       242222
E          0x6400 (at "... ghost is me")

[Intro]

  Eadd9                               Dadd9
  :   .   .   .     :   .   .   .     :   .   .   .     :   .   .   .
|---0-------0-----|---0-------0-----|---0-------0-----|---0-------0-----|
|-------9-------9-|-------9-------9-|-------7-------7-|-------7-------7-|
|-----11------11--|-----11------11--|-----9-------7---|-----6-------7---|
|---------9-------|---------9-------|-0-------0-------|-0-------0-------|
|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------|
|-0---------------|-0---------------|-----------------|-----------------|

Eadd9
 If you could read my mind, love,
Dadd9
 What a tale my thoughts could tell.
Eadd9
 Just like an old time movie,
Dadd9
 'Bout a ghost from a wishing well.

Eadd9
 In a castle dark
     A
or a fortress strong,
     Bsus2            C#sus2
With chains around my feet.
    A                  E
You know that ghost is me.

    A            G#m7
And I will never be set free
   F#m7              B                    Eadd9
As long as there's a ghost that you can't see.

If I could read your mind, love,
What a tale your thoughts would tell.
Just like a paperback novel,
The kind the drugstores sell.

When you reached the part
where the heartaches come,
The hero would be me.
But heroes often fail,

And you won't read that book again
Because the ending's just too hard to take!

[interlude as intro]

I'd walk away
like a movie star
Who gets burned in a three way script.
Enter number two:

A movie queen to play the scene
   F#m7             B                  C#sus2
Of bringing all the good things out in me.

But for now, love, let's be real;

I never thought I could act this way
         F#m7              B
And I've got to say that I just don't get it.

I don't know where we went wrong,
But the feeling's gone, And I just can't get it back.

If you could read my mind, love,
What a tale my thoughts could tell.
Just like an old time movie,
'Bout a ghost from a wishing well.

In a castle dark
or a fortress strong.
With chains upon my feet.
But stories always end,

And if you read between the lines,
You'll know that I'm just tryin' to understand

The feelin's that you lack.

I never thought I could feel this way
And I've got to say that I just don't get it.

I don't know where we went wrong,
But the feeling's gone, And I just can't get it back.

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