Alabama at Night

A redtail hawk sat watchful
At the faded edge of day
The phone polls and the pines
Rose from the scoured clay
The sun was slipping toward the gulf
In its own good time
And you would not think of death
If you drove on past the signs

The old men at the roadhouse
Weren't too polite to stare
Where we'd come from wasn't home
And we were far from leavin' there
The camera 'round my neck
Drew suspicious eyes to me
We were not there to talk
We were only there to see

When their faces had said nothing
Was then I stepped outside
And in the instant I knew I would not forget the sight
Alabama at night
Alabama at night

You took the wheel up 1-19
I scan the road ahead
Tryin' to let all I could see
Cover up all that I'd read
That hotel would not likely
Let a working man lie down
Like a current through its walls
Ran the sorrow and the sound

And I kneeled down to let it in me
Sure it would come if I gave it time
And I fumbled 'mongst a hundred words
But words don't do it right
Alabama at night
Alabama at night

A hundred words mean nothing
But what a thousand others say they might

Through sunlit rooms
The wealthy walk
And the pale unshaven men
To stand before each frame
Five seconds, maybe ten
You're to unveil
All that may grow
Wanted to portray
But I'm not there to talk
And if I were, I wouldn't say

Cross of rough cut branches
And the white grey shadowed sky
A child not far from birth
With the end etched in her eyes
The morning star above her
And a hem upon the breeze
The poor's no sacred song
Poor is a disease

And no hand reaches down from heaven
And no one denies it might
So patiently we wait here as all of it grows
Alabama at night
Alabama at night
Alabama at night