Gravel Road - William Elliott Whitmore

It must be that time of year

I’m feeling that pull again

I’ve got to get away from here

And back to where my feet can stand

Back to where the trees grow tall

And ain’t a sound for miles around

Except for the distant call

Of that lonely coyote’s howl

Life’s mysteries unravel when my tires hit that gravel

And I leave the paved road far behind

Every breath I breathe is one step closer to me

Easing my worried mind

Way back in the sticks

Is where I feel alive

In my rusty old '66

That won’t even go fifty five

Nothing can compare

To the joy that I’ve found

Every time I go back there

To my own spiritual ground

I’ll make a quart of sweet corn whiskey

From ten gallons of sour mash

I’ll turn a pile of firewood

Into a pile of sky grey ash

If there’s anything left inside me

That remembers what it’s like to feel

That cold rain falling on the top of my head

And the mud beneath my heels