Family History

i can see the old home place
grandma’s cornflowers
and QuÕn Anne’s lace
line the gravel one-track path
through the fields
of yellow grain
they were only half-way young
farmer’s daughters, farmer’s sons
they married in the crossroad’s church
near the Indiana line

they walked together down the state line road
with their arms around each other in their dusty clothes

one foot in Ohio and the other walked another time zone
half a dozen children born
snappin’ beans and shuckin’ corn
they gathered round the old upright piano
with their songs and violins
and i remember very well
all the stories we heard tell
about a working horse named red
and how they cried
then put him down

— chorus —

now the barn is falling in
timbers blown by a century old wind
and you can hear the creak and sigh
of the boys that once slept there
and as a young boy i had this dream
as i lay down by the old farm stream
wrapped in great-great grandad’s arms
with aunts and uncles all around

— chorus — and we walked together…