He was out on the highway smiling
A mystic in torn blue jeans
The kid left his trust fund to come out walking.
He hitched across this country
Backpack and a head full of dreams
Could've sworn he heard the earth a talking... talking

Sometimes, he said, don't it feel like the concrete's closing in?
We're putting bricks on the horizon
Was he chasing fool's gold... or a holy man walking a dirt road to the end?
I hitched a ride with Chris McCandless
Stepped in the wild of a dream

The horizon in South Dakota
Is an ocean of harvest grain
In a dusty silo we found work for the taking
We'd hitched up from California
But he never told me his real name
Never told me what past he was out here shaking
We're all shaking something...

Sometimes, he said, don't it feel like technology's closing in?
We're raising towers on the horizon
Was he chasing fool's gold... or a holy man walking a dirt road to the end?
I hitched a ride with Chris McCandless
Stepped in the wild of a dream

A stone... a path... a river of glass
The night sky... can you see stars from wherever you are?... wherever you
Are...

In a broken school bus they found him
In the heart of the Alaska range
The journey ends when the heart stops beating... time is fleeting

Was he chasing fool's gold,
Or a holy man walking a dirt road to the end?
I hitched a ride with Chris McCandless
Stepped in the wild with Chris McCandless
And I felt alive with Chris McCandless
I was wide awake in the dream... dream.