North Country Blues

Come gather 'round, friends

And I'll tell you a tale

Of when the red iron pits ran plenty

But the card board filled windows

And old men on benches

Tell you now that the whole town is empty.

In the north end of town

My own children have grown

While I was raised on the other

In the wee hours of youth

My mother took sick

And I was brought up my brother.

The iron ore poured

As the years passed the door

The drag-lines and shovels they was hummin'

'Till one day my brother

Failed to come home

the same as my father before him.

With a long winter's wait

From the window I watched

My friends they couldn't have been kinder

And my school it was cut

As I quit in the spring

To marry John Thomas a miner.

On the years passed again

And the givin' was good

With a lunch bucket filled born

The work was cut down

To a half a day's shift with no reason.

Then the shaft was soon shut

And my work was cut

And the fire in the air it felt frozen

then a man came to speak

And he said in one week

That number eleven was closin'.

They complain in the East

They are playin' too high

They say that your ore ain't worth diggin'

That it's much cheaper down

In the South American town

Where the miners work almost for nothin'

So the minin' gates locked

And the red iron rotted

And the room smelled heavy from drinkin'

And the sad silent song

Made the hour twice as long

As I waited for the sun to go sinkin'.

I lived by the window

As he talked to himself

This silence of tongues, it was buildin'

'till one mornin's wake

the bed it was bare

And I's left alone with three children.

The summer is gone

The ground's turnin' cold

The stores one by one, they are foldin'

My children will go

As soon as the grow

For there ain't nothin' here now to hold'em.