North Country Blues

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 [Am]
C[G]ome and gather round friends and I'll tell you a tale

 [Am]        [G]
O[Am]f when the red iron ore pits run a-plenty

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B[G]ut the cardboard filled windows and old men on the benches

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T[Am]ell ya now that the whole town is empty

In the north end of town my own children are grown
But I was raised on the other
In the wee hours of youth my mother took sick
And I was brought up by my brother

The iron ore poured as the years passed the door
The drag lines and shovels, they was hummin'
'Til one day my brother failed to come home
The same as my father before him

With a long winters wait from the window I watched
My friends, they couldn't have been kinder
And my school it was cut as I quit in the spring
To marry John Thomas, a miner

Oh the years passed again and the giving was good
With a lunch bucket filled every season
But with three babies born, the work was cut down
To half a day's shift with no reason

An' the shaft was soon shut and my work was cut
And the fire in the air, it felt frozen
'Til a man come to speak and he said in one week
That number eleven was closing

They complain in the east they payin' to high
They say that your ore ain't worth diggin'
That it's much cheaper down in the South American towns
Where the miners work almost for nothin'

So the minin' gates locked and the red iron rotted
And the room smelled heavy from drinkin'
When the sad silent song made the hour twice as long
As I waited for the sun to go sinking

I lived by the window as he talked to himself
The silence of tongues, it was building
'Til one morning's wake, the bed it was bare
And I's left alone with three children

The summer is gone, the ground's turning cold
The stores one by one they are folding
My children will go as soon as they grow
For there ain't nothin' here now to hold them

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