Silver Mantis
Kris Kristofferson

(As performed by T-Bone Burnett @ Tarrant Convention Center, Fort Worth, TX  5/16/76)
Introduced by Dylan as "Sashiko"

Seito lived in the canyon of the dragon
Sashiko lived in the valley of the moon
They met along the highway to Aomori
where danger in the forest loomed

Shashiko dressed in silk and dreamed of heroes
She was carried in a hammock draped and veiled
Her father was a cruel and brutal warlord
who fearful, kept her in a shell

Shashiko* he was but a lowly servant
but his master knew him to be true and brave
When he happened on the scene of her abduction
he sent her captors to their graves

Seito guarded Sashiko to her palace
he had no thought of ransom to conceal
She took him in and washed his cuts and bruises
and laid him softly down to sleep

When morning came she rose to tell her father
Of the stranger who had ruined the kidnap plot
But jealous and enraged her father seized him
and chained him in the dungeon dark

Sashiko's tears flowed like the river Edo
as she pleaded Seito's freedom face to floor
B'the warlord turned his back and would not hear her
His mercy 'd withered years before

When night fell Sashiko crept down into the dungeon
Two daggers hidden underneath her coat
And there they slept in death by hara-kiri
her father's chains around them both

* This should be "Seito". T-Bone confuses the names here
Transcribed from the concert tape by bobsboots.com

The concert