Ramblin' Jack Elliott

When you're lost in the rain in Juarez
And it's Eastertime too
And your gravity fails
And negativity don't pull you through
Don't put on any airs
When you're down on Rue Morgue Avenue
They got some hungry women there
And they really make a mess outa you

Now if you see Saint Annie
Please tell her thanks a lot
I cannot move
My fingers are all in a knot
I don't have the strength
To get up and take another shot
And my best friend, my doctor
Won't even say what it is I've got

Sweet Melinda
The peasants call her the goddess of gloom
She speaks good English
And she invites you up into her room
And you're so kind
And careful not to go to her too soon
And she takes your voice
And leaves you howling at the moon

Up on Housing Project Hill
It's either fortune or fame
You must pick up one or the other
Though neither of them are to be what they claim
If you're lookin' to get silly
You better go back to from where you came
Because the cops don't need you
And man they expect the same

Now all the authorities
They just stand around and boast
How they blackmailed the sergeant-at-arms
Into leaving his post
And picking up Angel who
Just arrived here from the coast
Who looked so fine at first
But left looking just like a ghost

I started out on burgundy
But soon hit the harder stuff
Everybody said they'd stand behind me
When the game got rough
But the joke was on me
There was nobody even there to call my bluff
I'm going back to New York City
I do believe I've had enough

Railroad Bill, Railroad Bill
He never worked, and he never will,
And it's ride, ride, ride.

Railroad Bill's a mighty mean man
Shot the light out of the poor brakeman's hand

Railroad Bill, up on a hill
Lightin' a seegar with a ten-dollar bill.

Railroad Bill took my wife,
If I didn't like it, gonna take my life.

Goin' on a mountain, goin' out west
Thirty-eight special stickin' out of my vest.

Buy me a pistol just as long as my arm
Shoot everybody ever done me harm.

Got a thirty-special in a forty-five frame,
I can't miss 'cause I got dead aim.

Railroad Bill, he ain't so bad
Whupped his mama, shot his old dad.

Early one morning, standing in the rain
Round the bend come a long freight train.

Railroad Bill a-comin' home soon
Killed McMillan by the light of the moon

McMillan had a special train
When they got there they was prayin'

Kill me a chicken, send me the wing
They think I'm workin', Lord, I ain't doin' a thing.

Kill me a chicken, send me the head,
Think I'm workin', Lord, I'm layin' in bed.

Gonna drink my whiskey, drink it in the wind
The doctor said it'd kill me but he didn't say when.

Take a trip with me in nineteen thirteen
To Calumet, Michigan, in the copper country
I'll take you to place called Italian Hall
And the miners are having their big Christmas ball

I'll take you in a door and up a high stairs
Singing and dancing is heard everywhere
I will let you shake hands with the people you see
And watch the kids dance 'round the big Christmas tree

There's talkin' and laughin' and songs in the air
And the spirit of Christmas is there everywhere
Before you know it, you're friends with us all
And you're dancing around and around in the hall

You ask about work and you ask about pay
They'll tell you, they make less than a dollar a day
Working the copper claims, risking their lives
So it's fun to spend Christmas with children and wives

Hey, a little girl sits down by the Christmas tree lights
To play the piano, so you gotta keep quiet
To hear all this fun you had not realize
That the copper-boss thug-men they are milling outside

The copper-boss thugs stuck their heads in the door
One of them yelled and he screamed, "There's a fire"
A lady, she hollered, "There's no such a thing
Keep on with your party, there's no such a thing"

A few people rushed and it's only a few
It's just the thugs and the scabs fooling you
A man grabbed his daughter and carried her down
But the thugs held the door and he could not get out

And then others followed a hundred or more
Most everybody remained on the floor
The gun-thugs they laughed at their murderous joke
And the children were smothered on the stair by the door

Such a terrible sight I never did see
We carried our children back up to their tree
The scabs outside still laughed at their spree
And the children that died there were seventy-three

Piano played a slow funeral tune
And the town was lit up by a cold Christmas moon
The parents they cried and the miners they moaned
See what your greed for money has done

Take a trip with me in nineteen thirteen
To Calumet, Michigan, in the copper country
I'll take you to place called Italian Hall
And the miners are having their big Christmas ball

I'll take you in a door and up a high stairs
Singing and dancing is heard everywhere
I will let you shake hands with the people you see
And watch the kids dance 'round the big Christmas tree

There's talkin' and laughin' and songs in the air
And the spirit of Christmas is there everywhere
Before you know it, you're friends with us all
And you're dancing around and around in the hall

You ask about work and you ask about pay
They'll tell you, they make less than a dollar a day
Working the copper claims, risking their lives
So it's fun to spend Christmas with children and wives

Hey, a little girl sits down by the Christmas tree lights
To play the piano, so you gotta keep quiet
To hear all this fun you had not realize
That the copper-boss thug-men they are milling outside

The copper-boss thugs stuck their heads in the door
One of them yelled and he screamed, "There's a fire"
A lady, she hollered, "There's no such a thing
Keep on with your party, there's no such a thing"

A few people rushed and it's only a few
It's just the thugs and the scabs fooling you
A man grabbed his daughter and carried her down
But the thugs held the door and he could not get out

And then others followed a hundred or more
Most everybody remained on the floor
The gun-thugs they laughed at their murderous joke
And the children were smothered on the stair by the door

Such a terrible sight I never did see
We carried our children back up to their tree
The scabs outside still laughed at their spree
And the children that died there were seventy-three

Piano played a slow funeral tune
And the town was lit up by a cold Christmas moon
The parents they cried and the miners they moaned
See what your greed for money has done

I'm a roving gambler,
And I gamble down in town.
Whenever I meet with a deck of cards,
I lay my money down,
Boys,I lay my money down

I've gambled up in Washington,
Gambled down in Maine,
I'm on my way to Georgia
To knock down my last game,
Boys, knock down my last game.

Well, I had not been in Washington,
Many more weeks than three,
When I fell in love with a pretty
Little girl,
And she fell in love with me.
And she fell in love with me.

She took me in her parlor,
She cooled me with her fan,
She whispered low in her mama's ear,
"I love this gamblin' man,
Ma, I love this gamblin' man."

"Well, daughter, my dear daughter,
How can you treat me so,
To leave your poor old mama,
And with this gambler go,
And with this gambler go?"

"Well, mama, my dear mama,
You know I love you well,
But the love I hold for a gamblin'
Man
No human tongue can tell,
Ma, no human tongue can tell.

"I'd never marry a farmer,
He's always in the rain.
I'd rather marry a gamblin' man
With a big gold watch and chain,
Ma, big gold watch and chain.

"And I'd never marry a railroad man,
The reason I'll tell you why,
Never did see a railroad man
Who wouldn't tell his wife a lie,
Ma, wouldn't tell his wife a lie.

"I hear the train a-comin',
Comin' around the curve,
Whistling and a-blowin'
And a-strainin' every nerve,
Ma, strainin' every nerve.

"It's good-bye, good-bye, mama,
Tell you if I can,
If you ever see me comin' home again,
It will be with a gamblin' man,
Ma, be with a gamblin' man."

Take a trip with me in nineteen thirteen
To Calumet, Michigan, in the copper country
I'll take you to place called Italian Hall
And the miners are having their big Christmas ball

I'll take you in a door and up a high stairs
Singing and dancing is heard everywhere
I will let you shake hands with the people you see
And watch the kids dance 'round the big Christmas tree

There's talkin' and laughin' and songs in the air
And the spirit of Christmas is there everywhere
Before you know it, you're friends with us all
And you're dancing around and around in the hall

You ask about work and you ask about pay
They'll tell you, they make less than a dollar a day
Working the copper claims, risking their lives
So it's fun to spend Christmas with children and wives

Hey, a little girl sits down by the Christmas tree lights
To play the piano, so you gotta keep quiet
To hear all this fun you had not realize
That the copper-boss thug-men they are milling outside

The copper-boss thugs stuck their heads in the door
One of them yelled and he screamed, "There's a fire"
A lady, she hollered, "There's no such a thing
Keep on with your party, there's no such a thing"

A few people rushed and it's only a few
It's just the thugs and the scabs fooling you
A man grabbed his daughter and carried her down
But the thugs held the door and he could not get out

And then others followed a hundred or more
Most everybody remained on the floor
The gun-thugs they laughed at their murderous joke
And the children were smothered on the stair by the door

Such a terrible sight I never did see
We carried our children back up to their tree
The scabs outside still laughed at their spree
And the children that died there were seventy-three

Piano played a slow funeral tune
And the town was lit up by a cold Christmas moon
The parents they cried and the miners they moaned
See what your greed for money has done