Hats Worn Low
 
Jay birds and red sashes, belly guns and hats worn low
Boots with spurs to jingle and bottles empty to throw
Out across the desert sand at a campsite while on the run
As flames licked wood to ashes before the rising sun
 
Standing around the fire the boys did a shadow dance
Faces smiled or frowned as they cussed their latest chance
To escape the law that reachedÉ for them across the hills
Crawling up their spines like late night desert chills
 
Three were under sixteen years, three were thirty plus
Two more were over fifty, the oldest one was Gus
They'd signed up to ride behindÉ a man taking land
Hired guns to hell and back with him to make a stand
 
They'd seen hard times and had the sand to shoot a man
Mean is what they had to be to follow out the plan
They had only met two weeks ago remnants of the war
Orphans, soldiers, outlaws ready to settle a score
 
They rode to scare the farmers and shot pigs and cows
Forcing wagons off the road they even burned a house
They used a hidden valley they had found the entrance to
Stolen horses and cattle were re-branded to sell anew
 
the tide it finally turned when the Army sent troops along
Indian scouts and Buffalo soldiers rode to undo the wrong
They found the gangs hideout and they shot two down
Three more were rounded up and brought to trial in town
 
Of the three that escaped including the old man Gus
Two got shot down in a bar in El Paso, Texas
The old man made his escape to a town far away
Worked as a hotel clerk with nothing much to say
©Steve Dirksen