Slaid Cleaves - Below guitar chord

Below

By Slaid Cleaves

CD – Wishbones 2004

Tabbed By Larry Mofle

rmofle@satx.rr.com

6/11/04

Capo 1

Bm

There's an old dirt road just off Route 9

G A Bm

Fades into the lake at the low water line

Bm

Sometimes I wander down that road alone

G A Bm

Remembering the town that I once called home

I grew up in the valley, every neighbor a friend

Until the modern world started creeping in

One day came the lawyers with cash in hand

They swore that our village would light up the land

Chorus:

G Bm

The dusky waters move cold and slow

D A7

And ghosts of a village still wander below

G Bm

Homesteads of families and friends forevermore

A G D

Haunting the valley below this sparkling shore

Surrounding the valley was a painted red line

Drawn by Company men, like marking a crime

A silent reminder that all inside it must go

Or be lost to the rising Dead River's flow

Some folks took the money, started grinding gears

While the rest of us held out for twenty-odd years

We watched our town like a photograph fade

As the Company came to take it all away

They tore down the church, the schoolhouse burned

They dug up the graves, the wheels of progress turned

They got Dutchie's Store and Haven's Pool Hall

When the dozers rolled it shattered us all

Chorus

Old May Savage stayed as long as she could

Her house on the hill towered over the flood

It rose up alone in the dark of night

Its face on the water in the cold moon light

I shake off the memories, on my lips a prayer

Thanks for the grace and the beauty down there

And while the porchlights glow all over the state

There's nothing but darkness under the lake

Chorus