Like many fans of 'Astral Weeks,' local musician and marketer Ryan Walsh wondered about this for years.

But his Cambridge/Boston period remained an under-explained footnote in his biography, an anomaly without context. In the years following the album's November 1968 release, the vague tidbit that the songwriter had lived in Cambridge for a while became received wisdom among fans of the deeply affecting, deeply mysterious piece of work, by many accounts Morrison's masterpiece.

But what the heck did they have to do with this album, a deeply meditative exercise in memory and nostalgia that was recorded in New York City and teems with references to Belfast? It always seemed safe enough to assume Morrison had written these words. Knew you had the blues, saw you coming from across the river. I saw you coming from Cambridgeport with my poetry and jazz, When I got back it was like a dream come true I saw you coming from the Cape, way from Hyannis Port all the way,

But on the back cover of Van Morrison's much-cherished album 'Astral Weeks,' there is an unexplained bit of verse that links the work to a different place altogether. Its song lyrics are dotted with references to the artist's native Ireland. Facebook Email Van Morrison performing at Spring Sing on Boston Common in 1968.