Let The Branches Turn a Mourning State of Brown

I was a father in my youth
with a mother half my age
in the year the fields went dry
and the crops were burned away
there was talk of work out west in a California mine
so I tore my home and family there for a better way of dying
but the only difference in the east and west I recognized
were the faces and the names I met in the unemployment lines

A man knew of my hardened times and offered me to buy
a better life of luxury for evenings with my wife
Though violence was no friend of mine and hatred never known
I felt the devil's raging fire posses the essence of my bones
And though we swore we'd settle on the square
when the sun's the height of perfect noon
I shot him, sleeping, at the stroke of midnight 'neath the howlin moon

Let the branches turn a mourning state of brown 
the day they lay your murdered bodied down
let their roots embrace your bones 
and wrap around 
to keep you comforted & warm beneath this stoney ground

Now, the man id shot a'sleeping was a man who all adored
and my face was made to poster's hung and all sent searching for
how we ran through California with the hounds a'closing in
with the only shot for living through the river none could swim
as the pistol shots rang out I watched the waves billow with blood
and saw the face of my beloved wife and starving only son
as my spirit carried over and my soul was overcome
I found that living by the barrel promised closure by the gun

Let the branches turn a mourning state of brown 
the day they lay my murdered bodied down
let their roots embrace my bones 
and wrap around (me)
to keep me comforted & warm beneath this stoney ground