All Loose Things

Album: The Ruffian's Misfortune

Written by Ray Wylie Hubbard

Right before the harvest a blackbird sings

Look at them fools down there ain’t got no wings

Storm is a coming rain’s about to fall

Ain’t no shelter round here for these children at all

Scarecrow singing a song by Kevin Welch

Thunder is rumbling as if the devil himself did belch

Now the dirt is spattering turning into mud

Erasing all traces of broken bones and blood

All loose things end up being washed away

Roosters in the cornstalks pecking at grains

A peddler walks by says, “Why am I cursed like Cain?

I’m all lust and furies doomed to sell my wares

I think I’d been better off not saying prayers

Old harlequins and pilgrims always will believe

Was their savoir on a cross died between two thieves

Ask them and they’ll tell you the son was sacrificed

To undo the sin of Eve that cost us paradise

A dying crap shooter with whiskey on his breath

Is betting inside numbers shootin’ dice with death

Says, “All I ever roll is deuces treys and twelve’s”

Blackbird says ‘The gods can’t save us from ourselves’

All loose things end up being washed away