That was an inspired song that came to me. I felt like I was just putting down words that were coming from somewhere else, and I just stuck it out.
~Bob Dylan (“Biograph” notes)

“That’s an excellent song, very painless song to write,… It took like 12 seconds – or that’s how it felt.”
~Bob Dylan (to Robert Hilburn – Feb 1992)

…But “Every Grain of Sand” is something special: the “Chimes of Freedom” and “Mr. Tambourine Man” of Bob Dylan’s Christian period. A pearl among swine, it has surety and strength all down the line. Also vulnerability.
~Paul Nelson (from his famous “Rolling Stone Magazine” review of “Shot Of Love” – Oct. 1981)

 

On 11th place on my top 200 list comes this diamond. A masterpiece with lyrics so beautiful you almost loose the music listening to it… the music is also fantastic and it contains two of Dylan’s best harmonica solos’s.

It was recorded early May 1981 (May 4, 1981) @ Clover Recorders, Los Angeles, California.

The love in ‘Every Grain Of Sand’ , though firmly rooted in Dylan’s conversion experience and his Bible studies, immediately and obviously reaches beyond it’s context to communicate a deeply felt devotional spirit based on universal experiences: pain of self-awareness, and sense of wonder or awe of the beauty of the natural world.
~Paul Williams (BD Performing Artist 1974-86)

As Paul Williams points out.. you don’t have to be a religious person to find beauty & comfort here:

I hear the ancient footsteps like the motion of the sea
Sometimes I turn, there’s someone there, other times it’s only me
I am hanging in the balance of the reality of man
Like every sparrow falling, like every grain of sand

Here is a GREAT video… matching pictcures to the lyrics in a brilliant way:
PS! It can be a bit slow to load.. but it’s worth the extra seconds…

The key to the performance is its motion: it moves like the sea, forth and back and forth and back, filled with the quality of restfulness but never resting.
~Paul Williams (BD Performing Artist 1974-86)

Wikiepdia:

Released	1981
Recorded	May 4, 1981 at the Shot of Love recording sessions
Genre	Rock, gospel, pop
Length	6:15
Writer	Bob Dylan
Producer	Chuck Plotkin, Bob Dylan

“Every Grain of Sand” is a song written by Bob Dylan and originally released on his 1981 album Shot of Love. It was subsequently included on the compilation Biograph. An alternate take of this song was released in The Bootleg Series Volumes 1-3 (Rare & Unreleased) 1961-1991. It appeared on the soundtrack for the 1997 film Another Day In Paradise.

The song was well known for its haunting imagery, which some have compared to that of William Blake. Although it is filled with numerous Biblical references, it may also have been partly inspired by the following lines from William Blake’s Auguries of Innocence:

To see a world in a grain of sand
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour.

Marked by an ethereal quality that isn’t found elsewhere on Shot of Love, “Every Grain Of Sand” is one of Dylan’s most celebrated recordings.

Lyrics:

In the time of my confession, in the hour of my deepest need
When the pool of tears beneath my feet flood every newborn seed
There’s a dyin’ voice within me reaching out somewhere
Toiling in the danger and in the morals of despair

Don’t have the inclination to look back on any mistake
Like Cain, I now behold this chain of events that I must break
In the fury of the moment I can see the Master’s hand
In every leaf that trembles, in every grain of sand

Oh, the flowers of indulgence and the weeds of yesteryear
Like criminals, they have choked the breath of conscience and good cheer
The sun beat down upon the steps of time to light the way
To ease the pain of idleness and the memory of decay

I gaze into the doorway of temptation’s angry flame
And every time I pass that way I always hear my name
Then onward in my journey I come to understand
That every hair is numbered like every grain of sand

I have gone from rags to riches in the sorrow of the night
In the violence of a summer’s dream, in the chill of a wintry light
In the bitter dance of loneliness fading into space
In the broken mirror of innocence on each forgotten face

I hear the ancient footsteps like the motion of the sea
Sometimes I turn, there’s someone there, other times it’s only me
I am hanging in the balance of the reality of man
Like every sparrow falling, like every grain of sand

Live versions:

SCivic Center Theatre
Lakeland, Florida
21 November 1981

–

Paris – 1 July 1984:

The real performing highlight [of “Every Grain Of Sand”] .. occurred one sultry night (28 June 1989) near the ancient streets of the Greek capital, the song being returned to base by a Dylan picking up an acoustic guitar and singing the song with only G.E. Smith – in the Fred Tackett role – to accompany him.
~Clinton Heylin (Still On The Road)

–

Starplex Amphitheatre
Dallas, Texas
28 July 1988

Fleet Center– Boston, Massachusetts
16 November 2002

–

Atlantico
Rome, Italy
6 November 2013

Check out:  Bob Dylan’s 200 best songs

-Egil