I'd play the Red River Valley
And he'd sit in the kitchen and cry
Run his fingers through seventy years of livin'
Wonder, "Lord, has every well I've ever drilled run dry?"
We were friends, me and this old man

Like desperados waitin' for a train
Desperados waitin' for a train

He's a drifter and a driller of oil wells
And an old-school man of the world
He taught me how to drive his car when he's too drunk to
He'd wink and give me money for the girls
And our lives were like some old western movie

Like desperados waitin' for a train
Desperados waitin' for a train

From the time that I could walk he'd take me with him
To a bar called the Green Frog Cafe
There were old men with beer guts and dominos
Just ying 'bout their lives while they played
I was just a kid they called his "Sidekick"

Like desperados waitin' for a train
Desperados waitin' for a train

One day I looked up and he's pushin' eighty
Brown tobacco stains all down his chin
To me he's one of the heroes of this country
So why's he all dressed up like them old men
Drinkin' beer and playin' Moon and Forty-Two

Like desperados waitin' for a train
Desperados waitin' for a train

A day before he died, I went to see him
I was grown and he was almost gone
So we closed our eyes and dreamed us up a kitchen
And sang another verse to that old song
"Come on, Jack, that son of a bitch is coming"

Like desperados waitin' for a train
Desperados waitin' for a train
Desperados waitin' for a train
Desperados waitin' for a train

Copyright: Warner Chappell Music, Inc.
Writer(s): Guy Clark