LYRIC WRITER AWARDS

All In

VERSE 1
I use to think that I was big slick
In the money all the time
But I found out I was a big fish
In a sea so sublime
I thought that I might make it
Wear the bracelet and the crown
But you broke my heart strings
When you busted my kings and you took my chips down

CHORUS
I may have been a fool on the flop, but I made the turn
The river is rollin’, there's one card to burn
You could hurt me so badly, that it might be a sin
But I've counted my percentage, and I know I can win
So when it comes to lovin you, I'm all in, oh baby I'm all in.

VERSE 2
We play the game for high stakes
We play the game for keeps
But we know once a bets been laid
A loser often weeps
But I know we can make it
We can turn this thing around
Cause when it comes to your love babe
You can never keep me down

BRIDGE
I've waited a life time
For the right time to come along
This time is the right time
Cause I know with your love I just can't go wrong

The Marionette's Parade

VERSE 1
Whose strings are these that lift my arms
What of these dreams that work their charms
With dancing meters and bright red clothes
We entertain on tippy toes
Look at this, look at me
I wish I knew just how to be
You shake my hand, I walk like this
You only see external bliss

CHORUS
Our acting is deserving all the love that's in your hearts
And you're clapping cause you're happy to see the Marionette's March
We entertain you and sustain you as we fill our life's crusade
But you fail to see our tears inside the Marionette's Parade

VERSE 2
I want so much to be so real
And feel those things that people feel
I need so much to have a heart
And not to live a world apart
Pull my strings make me sing
Make me do amazing things
Let me fly don't ask why
I hide this sadness deep inside

CHORUS

BRIDGE
I'm happy when I'm on the stage
That's when I feel I got it made
So sad when I'm back on the shelf
And must deny my one true self

CHORUS

Hearing Things

VERSE 1
I can tell Joe Rodger's pickup from the other side of town
I know someone's burning brush, just by that crackling sound
See I can hear a pin drop, way up on this hill 

When that 5 o'clock work whistle blows, the boys go racing home
If Terry Tanner's screen door slams his girlfriend's good as gone
Every sound in town means something, normal folks agree
But up here on this hill at night, sounds aren't what they seem

CHORUS
Cause when the storms blow, that banging window shutter, is you knocking at my door
Every hard rain, sounds just like you crying, the day you went away
I'm not crazy, just scared of all the sounds your memory brings
When I'm hearing things

VERSE 2
Our lunch today is meatloaf, I overheard that pretty nurse
That steel racket down at Jake's Garage means he's about to curse
Those barking dogs on Main Street, got a calico up a tree

That quiet hush doctor Body, spreading gossip down this hall
And I'm not one to eavesdrop, but he thinks he knows it all
He says I'm not crazy, that I'm well enough to leave
But judging by the sounds up here, I'd have to disagree

CHORUS 2
Cause when the storms blow, a lighting flash is a car crash, fifteen years ago
In every hard rain, I can hear that medic saying, she's in a better place
Am I crazy or just scared of all the sounds your memory brings
When I'm hearing things

BRIDGE
All my life, I've had you hear, living without fear
But since you've gone, I'm not sure what life sounds like all alone

[REPEAT CHORUS 2]

OUTRO
I can tell Joe Rodgers pickup from the other side of town
A good friend comes on visiting hours when he hears you're feeling down

 

Blue-Collar Cowboy

VERSE 1
I'm an ol' fashioned man
And I'm fixin' to take a stand
On all these high-tech ways to communicate

Spam & spies, web-wide,
I get Google-eyed
Yahoo? Yeehaw!
It's all over-advertised
Don't need no pills for lovin', or GPS to navigate

CHORUS
I'm a BLUE-COLLAR COWBOY, thank-you kindly
Don't look on the web
You'll never find me
I just figured out the remote on my TV
My PC's a pile a debris
Because I forgot the passkey
I'm a BLUE-COLLAR COWBOY, thank-you kindly

VERSE 2
I don't know how to retrieve email
I ain't never logged-in to a yard sale
I'm not the kind'a guy who "chats" in a chatroom

Blue-tooth, WiFi, don't know why I even tried
Accessories and manuels stacked up by my bedside
It'll all end up in a pile underneath my broom

[REPEAT CHORUS]

BRIDGE
Stop by the house
Write me a letter
Holler my name
It works so much better

Tag, You're It

VERSE
See that woman pushing that stroller there?
Yeah that’s the one with the wild brown hair
You may think housewife when you see her now
But in her crazier days, we all tried to chase her down
She used to yell
 
CHORUS
Just Try and catch me Romeo,
I’m flyin fast and you’re movin too slow
Time’s racing by and this moment’s gonna pass
Tag, you’re it, now step on the gas
 
VERSE
At 16 her parents gave her her dream
The keys to a beautiful racing machine
Friday night, she pulled up next to me
Revved up her engine, and flew off with a wink
And she screamed
 
CHORUS
Just Try and catch me Romeo,
I’m flyin fast and you’re movin too slow
Time’s racing by and this moment’s gonna pass
Tag, you’re it, now step on the gas
 
BRIDGE
She had two hands on the wheel and one foot to the floor
Laughing sayin’ come on baby show me what that engine’s for
 
VERSE
The last time we saw her my senior year
A black mustang passed her on the road out of here
She took it as a challenge caught up to him quick
Brown eyes sparkling, that cloud of dust was thick
She must’ve told him
 
CHORUS
Just Try and catch me Romeo,
I’m flyin fast and you’re movin too slow
Time’s racing by and this moment’s gonna pass
Tag, you’re it, now step on the gas
 
VERSE
She came back few years ago all settled down
Riding shotgun in that mustang without her racing crown
That guy she married managed to win that race
Man, that must’ve been one hell of a chase
With her yellin’
 
CHORUS
Just Try and catch me Romeo,
I’m flyin fast and you’re movin too slow
Time’s racing by and this moment’s gonna pass
Tag, you’re it, now step on the gas
Tag you’re it now step on the gas

Dusty Bibles

Well they say Saddam Hussein was a baller
When you asked him how tall he was, he said "taller!"
And Reagan said there was no better man to stockpile nukes while we set up Japan
Then the time came and a Bush had to burn
All the bridges we built with the teeth of the unlearned.
They said he killed his mother and he had three wives--
Dusty Bibles lead to dirty lives


Now I don't know how they do it on other planets
I'm sure they've got gospels that run the whole gammet
With idols and books and moral codes, shock absorbers for the rocky roads
But one thing's for certain now understand, in this here country it's the law of the land
Repeat after me if you wanna survive--
Dusty Bibles lead to dirty lives

Shadow Of A Child

VERSE
The back roads know my number
They call me ever summer
And my childhood ain't long-distance
When my eyes take in the scene
There's a boy in the meadow
Running faster than his shadow
There's a SHADOW OF A CHILD in me

CHORUS
There's a SHADOW OF A CHILD in me
Holding on to every hope and dream
I can't deny, I try, but I can't hide
The SHADOW OF A CHILD in me

VERSE
When the gravel dusts my windshield
Memories blossom in the fields
And my future fills with promises
As far as I can see
There's a freedom here I treasure
One my heart will not surrender
There's a SHADOW OF A CHILD in me

[CHORUS]

BRIDGE
Success may be the pride of life
But, that's not what I believe
The Good Book says a child's faith
Is everything I need

[CHORUS]

Home To Dallas

Watching the sheets of rain fall down
On southern Kansas, near an Oklahoma border town
I hadn't planned a stop 'til Amarillo
But then I hadn't planned on leaving yesterday
With nothing but my clothes and shoes and bankroll
A bottle filled with pocket change and half of last week's pay

[CHORUS]

Home to Dallas
Just another long days drive should get me there
Home to Dallas
Not a single winding road from here to there
And if God can really hear you when you pray
Then it's time I saw a rainbow and the storm clouds blew away
So I'll just close my eyes and I'll be home today
Home to Dallas

Looking for sun behind a cloud
A little game of hide and seek I'm not too old or proud
I never planned to live along the hiway
But choices often narrow to a few
At every turn I've gone around the long way
Life is filled with things you want and things you have to do

[CHORUS]

[BRIDGE]

The rain would not have stopped me fifteen years ago
Maybe wisdom does go hand in hand with age
If I can get this storm to drop me just a little bit down the road
Where it's warm and dry and nothin's in my way
I'll be home to Dallas

[Who knows, someday I might use this verse]
Watching the heat rise off the road
Checking that horizon for a sign I might be home
The city rises up from out of nowhere
Just beyond the wells and the desert sage
I've memorized the place that I can see clear
It's like watchin the canvas come to life in a painters' skyline page

[CHORUS]

Big Montana Sky

Beneath big skies on the T Bar Y, forty years I worked there til'
The old folks sold out to the bank 'cause cows couldn't pay the bills
A Denver lawyer bought the place for a trophy ranch estate
The realtor came, took down the T Bar name
And put a padlock on the gate.

Cowboyin's all that I've ever known
Sunset comes swiftly, all purple and roan
This land's worth a ransom, and so when I die
Please save me a few acres of that Big Montana Sky

That lawyer drives up here a couple times a year in a Cadillac SUV
With his CEO friends lookin' to land the dandy elk I used to see
They'll be huntin' til the night falls, you can hear them shootin' still
But there ain't no sound like the peace I found
Trailin' cattle through them hills

Cowboyin's all that I've ever known
Sunset comes swiftly, all purple and roan
This land's worth a ransom, and so when I die
Please save me a few acres of that Big Montana Sky

Now I'm rentin' a motel room by the month south of Great Falls
With a one-ring hot plate burner and asbestos in the walls
Once I dreamed I'd have a few acres, a couple cows to call my own
But all I can scratch is an eight-foot patch
Where I'll lay these crippled bones.

Cowboyin's all that I've ever known
Sunset comes swiftly, all purple and roan
This land's worth a ransom, and so when I die
Please save me a few acres of that Big Montana Sky

Cowboyin's all that I've ever known
My sun's goin' down and my years have all flown
Montana's ground is something only big money can buy
But this blue vault above Montana...
...is still anybody's sky.

If I Were A Book

If I were a book
You said I'd be a mystery
Uncertain at the end, I guess
Keep you at the edge of me
But I feel more like a tragedy
Playing out the hero's part
Dying just before the lesson's learned
And you promise me your heart

If you were a book
It's poems you would be
Where understanding comes so slow
And meaning hides so deeply
But I'm gonna write a brand new book
In a novel sort of way
Gonna stare at these blank pages
Until you tell me what they say

If I were a book
You said I'd be a mystery
Uncertain at the end, I guess
Keep you at the edge of me
Well if I am that book
I'm very near the end
So hold me close, and read my heart
And tell me how we end

Wheatland County Line

1st Verse

I'm heading west on 94
Into mountain time
Towards the red of a setting sun
In a big Montana sky
For ten long years I've been away
From sagebrush and plains
It took my mama's dying
To bring me home again

Chorus

Where the Musselshell winds
Beneath the cottonwood trees
And the sight of those mountains
Will bring you to your knees
I know there will always
Be room enough for me and mine
Across the Wheatland County Line

2nd Verse

Alcohol became her lover
But it did her wrong
Her days were stolen long before
Her memories were gone
When I was still a child
She began to slip away
I couldn't keep her from her demons
But I'll be with her today

Repeat Chorus

Bridge

Grandma and Grandpa
Are sleeping by their stone
Under wide open spaces
The prairie embraces
Another daughter coming home

Repeat Chorus

Southern Boy's Dream

1st Verse

It's a Bulldog's bark on a Georgia Saturday night
a Tiger fightin' with a Rolling Tide
Just West in Alabama
It's a six year old shakin' on his daddy's knee
He's freezing cold but hopin' he might see
his first white buck

Chorus

It's an eight second ride and a tent pitched by a campfire
a catfish on a bush hook late at night
It's mama's pecan pie and daddy's hard earned advice
an Abilene rodeo queen
It's a Southern boy's dream

2nd Verse

It's a local band playin' at the rodeo to the folks they know
who share their dream and hopes
of becoming a Tennessee starIt's an ole pick-up jacked up, beat up, and stuff
bikini tops covered in mud on the banks of Sandy Creek
It's a Southern boy's dream

Repeat Chorus

Bridge

Willie told my mama not to let me be a cowboy
but Mama said, "Son, follow your dreams!"

Repeat Chorus

Chances

1st Verse

Well I picked up a broken pencil, from the console that sat between my seats
I wrote down my name and number, on a matchbook, I found laying at my feet
I placed it on her icy windshield
Then I drove into the night
I've been told to not take chances, but this one felt so right
After all, a chance is just a chance
And if you'll never take it
It might be your last

Chorus

I'm taking CHANCES
That I never took before
I'm crossing over the lines
That I once stopped for
Yea, I don't know why I waited for so long
A chance is just a try
And trying can't be wrong
I'm taking CHANCES

2nd Verse

Well almost a week went by, and I must admit, I forgot what I had done
I had just sat down for dinner, said my grace, and then the phone begun
I didn't recognize the number
But I answered anyway
She said, I think you left your matches on my car the other day
And I'm sorry that I took so long to call