Let him roll, boys let him roll I bet he's gone to dallas rest his soul
Now he was a wino, tried and true Done about everything there is to do He worked on freighters, he worked in bars He worked on farms, 'n he worked on cars
Now it was white port whine, that put that look in his eye That grown men get when they need to cry And we sat down on the curb to rest And his head just fell down on his chest
He said "every single day it gets Just a little bit harder to handle and yet..." Then he lost the thread and his mind got cluttered The words just rolled off down in the gutter
He was a elevator man in a cheap hotel In exchange for the rent on a one room cell And he's years old before his time No thanks to the world, and the white port wine
And he said "son", he always called me son He said, "life for you has just begun" And then he told me the story that I heard before How he fell in love with a dallas whore
He could cut through the years to the very night That it all ended, in a whore house fight And she turned his last proposal down In favor of being a girl about town
Now it's been seventeen years right in line And he ain't been straight none of the time It's too many years of fightin' the weather And too many nights of not being together
So he died...
Let him roll, boys let him roll I bet he's gone to dallas rest his soul Let him roll, boys let him roll He always thought that heaven Was just a dallas whore
When they went through his personal affects In among the stubs from the welfare checks Was a crumblin' picture of a girl in a door An address in dallas, and nothin' more
Well the welfare people provided the priest And a couple from the mission down the street Sang amasing grace, and nobody cried 'cept some lady in black way off to the side
We all left and she's standing there The black veil covering her silver hair And one-eyed john said her name was alice She used to be a whore in dallas
Let him roll, boys let him roll I bet he's gone to dallas rest his soul Let him roll, boys let him roll He always thought that heaven Was just a dallas whore Let him roll, boys let him roll