You can tell a few things about the soul of a town From the blood of the men gone in the ground Bankrupt and buried by war that is carried out By messengers now Was born here and married too young staring The nose of the barrel down Went milk to whiskey to the courthouse sitting With her stoned in her wedding gown
My birthday's in two months and I'll be twenty one I am the second oldest to an only son Third generation to carry a gun I've got brown eyes like my mother does First I saw blood was in a soldier's hair Drying to his forehead in the dessert air I knew his name once but his face I don't dare Recall in the moments I go back there
Off the record do you see my tears On my face and in my ears As the silos reappear And all of our journeys have led us right back here
There's something in the water we've been passing around We've eaten the berries there is no doubt Like our father before us in his paper crown Kings of nowhere that was ever found The angels that used to be guarding our beds Have all wandered off and left us instead Too strung out and much too sick to defend Laying in the bathwater all lit up again
It's not a rumor it's more than true There's nothing I wouldn't do Be somewhere with only you Share a little of these constellation blues
When it comes to my death let it be slow May I be hunted in the hills I know Let God be certain I was ready to go But keep that secret from my children though