The Trip - Dave Rawlings Machine

Whistles blowing, people get on trains

Without knowing where they’re going

Someone’s daughter, someone’s sister

Someone’s teacher going down the road

With a body, a handkerchief

And a hatchet from an unspeakable crime

But there’s no one waiting for them

There’s no judgement down the line

Banjos ring and chickens squall

And little babies crow

The winter leaves, and the spring unwinds

And summer comes again, you know

Pink is the color of my true love’s dress

And black is the color of her heart

But I could never leave old Virginie

And so it never parts

Ebony face, ebony nails

Ebony coffin on the rails

Moving south, C-O-D

Going home to mother

Some said for valor, for glory, for treasure, for pride

Sometimes brother hates brother

So take a trip wherever your conscience has to roam

It’s much too hard to try to live a lie at home

My boots are cracked with road dirt and asphalt

Spit and broken dreams

Chewing gum and safety pins

All would hold me in at the seams

My pegs are loose, my screws too tightly wound to get in tune

But I still try sometimes on those golden summer afternoons

So take a trip wherever your conscience has to roam

It’s much too hard to try to live a lie at home

There’s a picture of an old black man in a beaver hat

He wears a hidden smile and a pair of white spats

Don’t pretend you didn’t notice his stare

You’re edgy and sweating and loaded for bear

The Skeleton’s Dance tonight

Bring your bottle and your boots

And your mandolin that Bianca Alatorre

Tried to shoot

Ah but what’s a bullet hole or two between friends?

And who can say when the well goes dry

Or where the story ends?

So take a trip wherever your conscience has to roam

It’s much too hard to try to live a lie at home

Hotel lives and hotel wives

That come and go with the sheets

But what’s a marriage

If it can’t be held up to kitchen heat?

Once I knew each valley and that beautiful shore

But I don’t go to the summer fair much anymore

So take a trip wherever your conscience says to roam

It’s much too much to try and live a lie at home

Your harmonica is blown, baby

Throw it away

Your denim shirt is ragged

And your dirty collar is frayed

I tried to play my horn for you

But I couldn’t seem to find a note

So I picked up pen and paper

And this is what I wrote

Go take a trip wherever your conscience has to roam

It’s much too hard to try to live a lie at home