Tenderfoot

Beyond the border town they call Contrition      ||:Dm /  /  / | Dm / Am7 Bb |
The badlands are just boulders and mesquite       | C  /  /  / | F  Eb Bb  / |
A school of Spanish friars built the mission      | Dm /  /  / | Dm / Am7 Bb |
But left because they couldn't take the heat      | C  /  /  / | D  /  /   / |
And further on the road to Absolution             | F Eb Bb  / | F  Eb Bb  / |
The mesas turn to mountains capped with snow      | F Eb Bb  / | C  /  Dm  / |
And the way becomes a form of execution           | F Eb Bb  / | F  Eb Bb  / |
That only hardened travellers can go              | F Eb Bb  / | D  /  /   / | D  /  /  / | 
                                     [he sinned  
     You can tell the horseman grieves for how    | Dm /  /  / | C  /  /   / |
     He rides a killing trail                     | Bb /  /  / | Eb /  /   / |
     Reminded of his hard heart by the hail       | Ab /  /  / | Cm /  /   / | G  /  /  / | 
     And of his folly by the chilling wind        | G  /  /  / | Ab /  Bb  / | C  /  /  / | 
                                                  | C  /  /  /:||
By day the canyon ramparts blaze their strata    
Like purple battlements he shall not pass        
The sunlight sears the horseman like a martyr    
The glacier's a magnifying glass       
And by night the clouds black out the constellations
While veils of icicles lock up his eyes         
He moves by echo through the cold formations     
Walls of drift and ice-fall fall and rise        
                                   
     You can tell the horseman grieves for how he sinned
     He rides a killing trail                    
     Reminded of his hard heart by the hail      
     And of his folly by the chilling wind       

He knows he made pretence of love too often      
His deadly carelessness went on for years        
At dawn the shields on his eyes will soften      
And all of his regrets will be in tears          
But far too late to go back and be gentle        
Or say how clearly now it comes to mind          
His pride at never being sentimental             
Was just a clever way to be unkind               
                                     
     You can tell the horseman grieves for how he sinned
     He rides a killing trail                    
     Reminded of his hard heart by the hail      
     And of his folly by the chilling wind       

Around him lie the stunning and the drastic      
Where nothing but the utmost can be felt         
The temperatures will always be fantastic        
Noon will never cool nor midnight melt           
A fitting climate for one so unfeeling           
Who once was so indifferent to distress          
He's goaded onward with his senses reeling       
Without the prospect of forgetfulness            
                                     
     You can tell the horseman grieves for how he sinned
     He rides a killing trail                    
     Reminded of his hard heart by the hail      
     And of his folly by the chilling wind       

The golden handshake and the lightning kisses    
Were all his for the asking in the past          
But the subtlety and softness that he misses     
For them the horseman always moved too fast      
And now at last to contemplate his error         
Facing the dimensions of his loss                
He journeys where the sky meets the Sierra       
That every man alive must one day cross          
                                     
     You can tell the horseman grieves for how he sinned   
     He rides a killing trail                    
     Reminded of his hard heart by the hail      
     And of his folly by the chilling wind       

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