In our days we will live like our ghosts will live
Pitching glass at the cornfield crows and folding clothes
Like stubborn boys across the road, we'll keep everything
Grandma's gun and the black bear claw that took her dog
And when sister Lowery says "Amen," we won't hear anything
The ten-car train will take that word, that fledgling bird
And the fallen house across the way, it'll keep everything
The baby's breath, our bravery wasted and our shame

And we'll undress beside the ashes of the fire
Both our tender bellies wound in baling wire
All the more a pair of underwater pearls
Than the oak tree and it's resurrection fern

In our days, we will say what our ghosts will say
"We gave the world what it saw fit, and what'd we get?"
Like stubborn boys with big green eyes, we'll see everything
In the timid shade of the autumn leaves and the buzzard's wing

Then we'll undress beside the ashes of the fire
Our tender bellies all wound around in baling wire
All the more a pair of underwater pearls
Than the oak tree and it's resurrection fern