A tiny green figure at the foot of a tall blue-grey cliff topped with a small white cloud.

Original artwork, not a still

Bob Dylan

I’ve been up the mountain and I had a choice. Should I come down? So I came down. God said, “Okay, you’ve been up on the mountain, now you go down. You’re on your own, free. Check in later, but now you’re on your own.”

Behind the line

What it means

Our interpretation.

The speaker recounts a choice about whether to descend after reaching a mountain's height, and says they came down. In this telling, God then releases them to live freely on their own, with only an occasional check-in expected. It reads as independence given with a light tether.

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