Goodbye Ruby

Goodbye, Ruby, watch you winding Down these snake trails that roll like rain drops in the dust Windy woman, blown my cover I sit here all alone but I would never sing this kind of song Wicked dreams Down drowning streams Of blood and other wild schemes That play like mold for the rust Swallow's wings And other old and tattered things The dull and fade of wedding rings Now this song is one of those There's fire in these hills, closer every day The wind calls the hangman to my name My father said the ocean would beat upon my grave And that on that day I would long for my home And it's family stone Here I am waiting in watercolor gray I'll wait for you or Jesus or any other technicolor day Howling dogs at the dust cloud walls Snapping at the heels of death To share with them a piece of the catch I long to see the Banyan trees or any other place Where the waves are made of thunder And the seabirds clean the blood from off my feet Oh, wicked ocean made my heart a beggar The crabs that ride the jet streams Are picking out the eyes of my dreams The fire in these hills gets closer every day The wind calls the hangman to my name My brother said the wild world would feed upon my skin And that on that day I would long for the farm And an honest simple faith The majesty of insect wings And the brittle of their bones Reminds me of a tropic wind Blowing through the skull of our home Ruby, I chased your laughter with elephant wings You left me for the law Left me bones for the grave Childish beauty, Sunday charm All has made a ghost of me, spirit dead, shackled arms As I hung the wind whipped your wild name And pierced the heart of a fading ghost For seabirds only death upon the plain The blood that beats this heart is blood upon the floor Ruby you lead the hangman to my door My mother said a woman would be the death of me And that on that day no god would hear An outlaw's dying prayer