Lyrics to a song inspired by the Coen brother's True Grit

You asked me what became of her

Well that I really couldn’t tell

I once drank in a bar alongside her father

And the man that killed him as well

She arrived in town, her clothes in tatters

Wanting to see that man in chains

Unblemished, tearless, but soul-shattered

He’d taken off across the range

No lawman ranger could have helped her

No man in town would stoop to care

But I was weary of that fickle ordered town

So for fifty silver coins I said, “I’ll hunt that Chaney down”.

We headed out across the river

To Chocktaw country with no trail

How can you say no to a daughter

A lost girl with a ranch saddle looking so frail

In drunken dreams I heard her screaming

Down by the shallow riverside

He stole upon her and she didn’t have the fight

And I didn’t have the sober legs, I didn’t have the sight

I hunted down that ruthless villain

Forsook my life to save her soul

I charged him down, though it was one man against four

Lost my horse and took a bullet too, but sent him through Heaven’s door

I didn’t hear much from her after

The West diminished in my palm

I joined Bill Hickock and we took off on the road

A monument to what we’d lost, a show too soon to close

The plains lay dormant for the winter

Of man’s expanding gridlock gloom

No mystery left, no gold or thunder

No hangings, sheriffs, shoot-outs at noon

She’ll have a man, a child to mother

A plot of land that’s not for sale

White picket fences used to cover

The fiery plains from which she hailed

The fiery plains from which she hailed