Mountain Girl

Sleeping in the corner of a boxcar bound for Boulder Got a life I like to leave behind a love I'd like to keep. With the River passing slowly through the desert night below me The thunder rips across the sky and wakes me from my sleep. Now I spent the later sixties in the Colorado Rockies, But California called when I was running out of bread . As Caroline tried not to cry, we slowly kissed our love goodbye And 10 years came between us is our separate lives we led. Now a man in search of girls and dreams can bend his mind and make it seem Like all good things are waiting in the next town round the bend. But all I got from the traveling life was a beat-up Ford and a nagging wife, And nothing in my future here but things that might have been. Another pour of Cutty Sark at a Chinese bar in Buena Park , I thought back on my life ‘till there was nothing more to say. So I didn’t find it too hard to walk out to that train yard And in the dusk I jumped aboard an eastbound Santa Fe. Now staring blankly at the wall a life of hatred I recall Our quiet nights were seldom as are fighting words increased. But I've left it all eight hours ago to start life I used to know, With the night chill on my blanket, ‘cross the River headed East. Pardon me but I've made one mistake. Can't you see I'm doing all I can. Let me be and I’ll find love a gain Because I'm going to see my Mountain Girl again. Author's note: Intended as a song, the last four lines are meant to be a chorus interspersed after every other stanza. Dedicated to Ian Tyson.