Track Insight / Lyrics
I stretch my canvas over red dirt,
Two strangers duck beneath my curved rim.
The moon thins, and cedars greet the dawn;
Train wheels bruise the blue before it's gone.
You came with dust across your linen sleeve,
I offered shade, and neither chose to leave.
Your compass swung where my branch points south;
I held the dew beneath a copper mouth.
The desert kept its secrets packed in sand;
We crossed the scrub with nearly touching hands.
Come beneath my branches, come out of the white,
We'll race the pale horizon into morning light.
Two silhouettes are crossing on the line,
While willow fibers twist through time.
Come beneath my branches, the soil knows best,
One green little shelter from the desert's rest.
At half past four, the tanker axle groaned,
Your pocket compass spun beneath the road.
I filtered dust from desert evening air,
And combed the heat from strands of silvery hair.
Across the arroyo, cattle watched us pass;
Two sets of footprints surfaced in the glass.
Come beneath my branches, come out of the white,
We'll chase a rising gull beyond the morning light.
Two silhouettes are floating on the line,
While sallow roots drink time.
Come beneath my branches, the soil knows best,
One sheltered passage from the dry heat's rest.
A stormcell bloomed above the alkali,
Your coat brushed mine, a scent of crushed pine.
I shed the rain in measured, sudden time,
Each silver rib conducting soft rainfall.
The sky drummed Solanum upon the hood;
We laughed and sailed across the flooded road.
Beneath the ballast, under prairie skies,
My roots remember drought and第一次 rain.
Your shoulders loosen when the engine dies;
A rare Magnolia blooms above the plain.
I am bent wood, but I have learned to bend;
Two lives grew briefly where the shadows blend.
The eastern ridge turned copper, then brass,
A locust clicked the darkness into glass.
Your stranger's outline sharpened in the gray;
I shed the last cold beads along the way.
Ahead, the rail line split the waking haze;
I kept you dry through all the night's delay.
Come beneath my branches, come out of the white,
We'll ride the waking chorus into morning light.
Two silhouettes are reaching for the line,
While hickory and time entwine.
Come beneath my branches, the soil knows best,
One lasting little shelter from the desert's rest.
At sunrise, porchlight, window, stone,
I watched you fold my darkness, then go home.
My ribs dry slowly by the warming wall;
A cedar sprig remembers summer rain and fall.
