The Ground Don't Want Me

Lyrics: Josh Ritter
Music: Ritter, Weir, Kaufman

Released with the Deluxe Edition of Bob Weir's Blue Mountain album. Bob Weir re-orders some of the lyrics from the Josh Ritter recording and makes some small changes to the lyrics.

Well I buried mama standing with the knife still in her chest
As per her last instruction and request
Said I don't think you'll see heaven, son, so where you're going, take it slow
Now the ground don't want me, mama
The ground don't want me, no no no

So I killed men in Blue Eye, New Life and Crystal Wells
In every town the broken hearted rang their steeple bells
For every man a box, for every hole a rose
Now the ground don't want me, mama
The ground don't want me, no no no

What is the body when the soul is flown
Is it just to be forgotten
I want to lay down in a field of bone
But the angels guard their garden

Then one morning near Arkana, I chanced to watch some violets rise
Their lunar blues unravelling, the [basking] stays at night
And I thought how sweet to sleep beneath violet flowers such as those
Now the ground don't want me, mama
The ground don't want me, no no no

Well I stacked the deck, I held the dead man's hand so many times
Eights and aces waiting for the end I prayed was mine
But guns and cards are all the same, each man must draw his own
Now the ground don't want me, mama
The ground don't want me, no no no

What is the body when the soul is flown
Is it just to be forgotten
I want to lay down in a field of bone
But the angels guard their garden

Sometimes I think about mama, with the knife still in her chest
Sometimes I think about all those lucky men I sent to rest
How it's them who all are sleeping, how it's me who is the ghost
Now the ground don't want me, mama
The ground don't want me, no no no

What is the body when the soul is flown
Is it just to be forgotten
I want to lay down in a field of bone
But the angels guard their garden