El Muerto

EL MUERTO
written by Doug Moreland, ASCAP (composer/author and publisher)

There's a legend on the Wild Horse Desert
down on the Nueces River
Seen a man ride a black mustang stallion
decked out in gold and silver
Serape for a cape, waving in the wind,
rawhide tapaderos
He had a sombrero, in it was his head,
swingin' from the horn of the saddle

El Muerto rides
Through the moonlit desert night
Lightning in his stride
Shooting to the sky
Flames from his nostrils burning red
And coal fire eyes in his severed head
El Muerto rides

Two ranch hands seen him late one night
when the moon was on high
Comanches tried, put arrows through his side,
but El Muerto still rides
It was Bigfoot and Creed confessed to the deed,
said they had a lesson to teach
So they tied ol' Vidal’s headless carcass up there
to show the fate of a Mexican horse theif

El Muerto rides
Through the moonlit desert night
Lightning in his stride
Shooting to the sky
Flames from his nostrils burning red
Coal fire eyes in his severed head
El Muerto rides

They finally corralled the stallion,
the horse thief is buried near the town of Ben Bolt
I was just a kid when I heard that tale
though it expands every time it’s told
Been a century and a half since that
south Texas headless horseman rode
There's folks who say on a Nueces ridge
some nights they see his ghost

El Muerto rides
Through the moonlit desert night
Lightning in his stride
Shooting to the sky
Flames from his nostrils burning red
Coal fire eyes in his severed head
El Muerto rides