Nightrider

When the sun sets down and the shadows rise
And the wind has wandered home
And the song of sleep pulls on your eyes
I shall set out alone
Along the trapper's trail we'll trot
Up to the timberline
Through glow upon the snow that's brought
Fluorescent by moonshine
Across the snow-blue snowshoe flats
Until the trail goes thin
To check the line of coyote traps
Along the rocky rim
The rim where they each stop to cry
Their sighs into the dark
Across the valleys far and wide
'Tis winter's meadowlark
And I can hear one calling now
From somewhere further on
So empty does it drift
And how his chorus carries on
The sound that sometimes even I
Will welcome as a friend
The mournful dead cold cry that sometimes
Tests the wits of men

Along the rim we wander
By the light of stars and moon
And time not ours to squander
For the day is rising soon
As here atop the palest ridge
We stop to watch the dawn
The glow above the Eastern Ledge
Says soon the night is gone
And gone am I
Along the draw
Before the shadows fade
And confident that no one saw
The midnight ride I made
Just tracks along the trapper's trail
And two coyotes less to wail

© 1999 Red Cliffs Press Music (BMI)