A coastal tanker stomping through the pack ice in the Quark,
a workout at Ullevi in haze.
Border station in Tornio an old woman on a kicksled,
Landsort lighthouse where the snow storm sweeps in.
Dense snow and sleet in the hills of Mariaberget,
hot and sweat at Statt in Härnösand.
A truck in the whirling snow between Kiruna and the distant,
flickering lights in Visby harbour.
It is then that the great melancholy rolls in
and from the sea blows an icy bleak wind.
In Malmö the mist is scratched by the ferries sirens,
and on the other side of the strait the world begins.
A lonely Volvo rips in the headwind on the Tjörn Bridge,
the cinema in Pajala gives "Deliverance".
Lapplandspilen bellows like a wild beast through the night,
the farms turns off their lights.
A storm-beaten Marstrand says its Pater Noster,
Stockholm City sways in drunkenness.
/ One refrain reprise and the third strophe is missing in the version sung by Amanda Bergman /
It is then that the great melancholy rolls in
and from the sea blows an icy bleak wind.
it is then that the great melancholy rolls in
and from the sea blows an icy bleak wind.