Si Kahn Lyrics
Courage

Courage

On This Old Farm

  Liner notes by Kathy Mattea

     He springs to life and we recognize, in his poignant sarcasm and staunch determination, a deep reaching of life for itself, the tenacious refusal to succumb to death or defeat.    Read the rest

*

Walking down my fences
And the barbed wire's broke and rusty everywhere
It ain't rained since August
There's a dirty cloud just hanging in the air
The pond is dry and dusty
Not a bucketful of water in the well
With the weather and the government
You bet your life the farmer catches hell

     And the moon is shining hard tonight
     The fire won't keep you warm
     It's a cold wind gonna blow on this old farm

No ma'am that's no scarecrow
That's just my old horse there standing in the dirt
No sir them's not patches
That's my elbows poking through this worn out shirt
No that's not a cotton patch
That's Johnson grass just choking out my weeds
Spend the whole damn summer
Making rows and digging graves for cotton seeds.

Daddy said that when you see
The new moon with the old moon in its arms
It's bound to be a sign of rain
But all I see are dust clouds on this farm
Just corn fields gone to ruin
And a cold and dry and dusty night wind blowing
No sir I'm not crying
No I don't know where I'm going but I'm going

*

Previous: Shoulders
Next: Custodian