Rice Field in the Distance

Old Hank's sitting on the front porch, rocking the days away
Ever since he went blind, you know he ain't had much to say
And there's a rice field in the distance up around the bend
Fourteen miles from the river and where it all began

Charlie was old Hank's boy and the last of a dying breed
A genuine cowboy, he was sturdy as a live oak tree
And if you ever had the pleasure to meet him, you was bound to hear a story or two
And he always did the best with what he had, it was no more than the saints could do

Charlie met this girl named Kate, soon she became his wife
But times was hard back then, and they did what they could to survive
They didn't have much of nothing, lived in a shack with a cold dirt floor
Till they bought 'em a two-story Roebuck house with Hank's pension from the war

And Billy Glenn's in the back, he's the youngest of Charlie and Kate's eight kids
He's trying to squeeze out another drop from a cow that just won't give
It was a hard scrabble, a way to come up, but he was his daddy's son
And he never complained about the work a minute, he just did what had to be done

In that rice field in the distance up around the bend
Fourteen miles from the river and where it all began
It's where time stood still, and the work it would never end
In that rice field in the distance up around the bend

Charlie died in that rice field, one day his heart just give out
And at his funeral the grown men wept and it was all they could talk about
All the stories that he shared with them and the lessons from him they learned
And the countless things that he'd done for them asking nothing in return

And Kate lived to be ninety-seven and on her dying day
The generations gathered in a circle and all began to pray
Yeah they reminisced about days gone by and sacrifices made for them
In that rice field in the distance up around the bend

Yeah that rice field in the distance up around the bend
Fourteen miles from the river and where it all began
It's where time stood still and the work it would never end
In that rice field in the distance up around the bend
May the circle be unbroken and the memories never end
Of that rice field in the distance up around the bend
Yeah that rice field in the distance