into a canopy of laurel and ridgepocket pine our forefathers walked their very last straight mile into hard, hard times back in them stricken days were they looking for something or were they turning away? and the first killing frost in the fade of autumn's gold bent their backs into the winters; bent their memories into songs and with one step low, they cut their furrows in the slopes and they built their wounded homes into the stoney mountain earth
and a longing was born for what always came before with a shiver in the bloodline with melody on a drone got shed of those lately ways
well the heavens went aflame and a father was struck down and act of god in a god fearing town and the voices of the hymnals sung of angels in the air oh a scalded heart will see symbols everywhere so cower your troublin' mind from the praise and the shouts opposition from within and defender from without like when the mountebanks rise, cynical and vain and dosey doe upon the ground where pretty polly was slain
oh the tremors of the earth never reached these dells you better keep your eyes down, son on the winding trail you can't walk a straight mile
oh traveler will you understand? there's a rhythm in despair it's the price for ancient songs it's the hand-me-down sorrow of a place where there's no future but the past goes on and on!
for the hills and the hollows and the silence of the pines you let me down, oh you broke my heart but I don't walk through the valley alone I always pray to Saint Joey Ramone oh sweet rock and roller, won't you set me free at last? and break open the western sky 'cause if you give me the chance I'll walk the straight mile