If You Could Read My Mind

by Gordon Lightfoot

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IF YOU COULD READ MY MIND 
By Gordon Lightfoot 
Key: G 

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If you could read my mind love 
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What a tale my thoughts would tell 
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Just like an old time mov-ie 
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'Bout a ghost from a wish-ing well 
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In a cas-tle dark or a for-tress strong 
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With chains up-on my feet 
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You know that ghost is me 
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And I will nev-er be set free, 
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As long as I'm a ghost that you can't see 

If I could read your mind, love 
What a tale your thoughts could tell 
Just like a pap-er-back nov-el 
The kind the drug-store sells 
Then you reached the part 
Where the heart-aches come 
The he-ro would be me. 
But he-ros of-ten fail 
And you won't read the book a-gain 
Be-cause the end-ing just to hard to take 

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I'd walk a-way, like a mov-ie star 
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Who gets burned in a three-way script 
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En-ter num-ber two: a mov-ie queen 
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To play the scene of bring-ing all 
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The good things out of me 
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But for now love, let's be real 
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I nev-er thought  I could act this way 
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And I've got to say  
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that I just don't get it 
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I don't know where we went wrong 
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But the feel-ing's gone  
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and I just can't get it back 

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If you could read my mind love 
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What a tale my thoughts would tell 
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Just like an old time mov-ie 
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'Bout a ghost from a wish-ing well 
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In a cas-tle dark or a for-tress strong 
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With chains up-on my feet 
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But stor-ies al-ways end 

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And if you read be-tween the lines 
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You'd know that I'm just try'n 
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To un-der-stand 
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The feel-ings that you lack. 
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I nev-er thought I could feel this way 
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And I've got to say 
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That I just don't get it. 
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I don't know where we went wrong 
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But the feel-ings gone, 
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And I just can't get it back