El Solitario

EL SOLITARIO

If you got the time to take, I got a tale to tell
It started in Westport Mizzou at the head of the Santa Fe Trail
I was drivin' six yoke of oxen, sixty hundred to the beam
We trailed 'em across the boundless plain to the Mexico territory

The man was dressed in a robe of rags, asked the boss if he could come
El Jefe figured it wouldn't hurt to have a man of God along
The padre said he must walk, but the boss man disagreed
Said that he must ride each day in the rockaway next to me

The priest climbed in the wagon, skinner gave the team a nudge
Four mules strained against the trees, but the wagon wouldn't budge
Then he said the strangest thing ever did I hear
"There is no team or wagon can carry what I must bear"

All the way along the trail the padre walked behind
'Til his face so caked with dust you could barely see his eyes
And sittin' 'round the camp fire he ate his one biscuit hard
I knew there that we shared dark secrets of the heart

Forty days and forty nights hard on the Santa Fe Trail
Lost too many to the runnin' fever, did our best to fare them well
The priest he spoke the holy words as if from a deep well of grief
While the sun burned down, dust clouds rolled, hail beat us without relief

The mountains rose and we rode them high over the Raton Pass
'Til a granite prow like the bow of a ship rose up from the rolling grass
And the last I saw of the padre, he raised himself up on that cross of stone
And he spent his days living the lonesome ways for what he could not atone