Capo 7th fret

Standard (EADGBE)

I had a lover, name was Grace

 She found me down in a lonely place

She dug me out with an old jar bow

 She dressed me up for to take me home

 She fed me words that I could not taste

 For I had no tongue, it had been replaced

 By a green and a-growin' flower which grew

 And I knew if I ever spoke I would speak true

We lived together in an old hotel

Broke-down palace with a wishing well

 The neighbour girl taught me how to spell

 And how to steal what I could not sell

 But I fed my tongue on the devil's rum

 And a roadhouse run by a godless bum

 On a drunken night with a stolen gun

 I shot my lover as she made to run

 The judge said "Son, what have you done?"

 But I didn't speak a word, no I didn't speak one

 And the judge sent me away

 And they buried my Grace, yeah, the very next day

They sent me out on a midnight train

 In the rain rollin' down through the dusty plain

4 men sittin' with an old shotgun

silver stars pinned on everyone

 They busted my mouth for to get at my tongue

 To see just how this had all begun

 So I opened my mouth like a dragon's breath

 I only spoke truth, but it only brought death

 And I laid those boys to rest

 For the truth in truth is a terrible jest

 For there ain't no road but the road to home

 There ain't no crops but the one's you've sown

 And if you learn one thing from me

 You better guard your tongue like your enemy

I came to ground in a one horse town

 On the western rim where the sun go down

 Where a branded man might start again

 For to ride his rung, for to lose his sin

 But my tongue kept growing, it would not cease

 I grew quite weary, couldn't get no release

 So I went to the magistrate and turned myself in

Picked up a shovel and he made the grin

 And they planted me by the sea

 Now the birds of the air make nests on me