“Watch the River Move” is a well-liked track by Bob Dylan, launched on his 1971 album New Morning. The lyrics are a poetic and evocative reflection on the passage of time and the great thing about nature. The track includes a easy but efficient melody and instrumentation, with Dylan’s signature harmonica enjoying a outstanding position.
The lyrics of “Watch the River Move” are full of images and symbolism, with Dylan utilizing the river as a metaphor for the relentless movement of time. The track’s opening strains, “I watched the river movement into the ocean/And I watched the seagulls fly,” set up the theme of nature’s cyclical nature and the inevitability of change. Dylan goes on to explain the river’s journey, noting the way it “carries the boats with the fishermen” and “washes away the sins of the world.” These lyrics counsel that the river is a drive for each creation and destruction, and that it’s in the end detached to the human expertise.
