"SING THE DELTA"

All songs written by Iris DeMent

Produced by Bo Ramsey, Richard Bennett & Iris DeMent

MUSICIANS:

Iris DeMent: vocals, piano, accoustic guitar

Richard Bennett: accoustic & electric guitar

Bo Ramsey: electric guitar

Dave Jacques & Byron House: electric & acoustic bass

Bryan Owings & Brad Pemberton: drums & percussion

Al Perkins: pedal steel & national steel

Reece Wynans: B3 organ

Jim Hoke: tenor sax

Steve Herman: trumpet

Jen Gunderman: accordion

Recorded and mixed by Richard McLaurin at House of David, Nashville, TN

Additional recording by Adam Bednarik at House of David, Nashville, TN

Mastered by Gavin Lurssen

LYRICS TO SONGS ON ‘SING THE DELTA’

Go On Ahead And Go Home
Go on ahead and go home, Go on ahead and go home
Boy, you’ve done your best, Time you took your rest in the sheltering loam
Go on ahead and go home, Go on ahead and go home
The spirits of the dead will meet you up ahead
You won’t be alone

Go let your mama see you smile, Go let your mama see you smile
Mama’s gonna wait however long it takes, but it’s sure been awhile
Go let your mama see you smile, Go let your mama see you smile
She’s standing in the sun sayin’ “Boy, your works been done
by a long, long mile.”

Down where the cotton grows tall, down where the cotton grows tall
Where the bramble rose and blue hydrangea grows beside the old mare’s stall
Down where the cotton grows tall, Down where the cotton grows tall
And a fragrant delta breeze shakes the cypress trees down deep in the Fall

In the deep of the night, In the deep of the night
By the river so still where sorrows come to heal and wrongs are made right
Down in the deep of the night, In the deep of the night
On a creaking porch swing, the ancient ones sing “everything is alright”

Go on ahead and go home, Go on ahead and go home
Boy, you’ve done your best, Time you took your rest in the sheltering loam
Go on ahead and go home, Go on ahead and go home
The spirits of the dead will meet you up ahead
You won’t be alone


Before The Colors Fade
Before the colors fade from view
I sit alone remembering you
Alll those things you’d say and do
And the feel of being next to you
The angles of your sweet, old, face
The voice that filled my life with grace
I walk as through a sacred place
Before the colors fade

Everybody comes and then they go
Everybody fades and glows
Everybody falls and climbs
Some people go before their time
But no one sparkled quite like you
I’m gonna miss you through and through
I’ll visit every shade and hue
Before the colors fade

Tonight I’ll read you like a book
Every twist and turn you took
Every song and every look
All you gave, all you took
In time you might seem like a dream
But until then and in between
I’ll linger on each sacred scene
Before the colors fade

Before the colors fade from view
I sit alone remembering you
And all those things you’d say and do
And the feel of being next to you
The angles of your sweet, old face
The voice that filled my life with grace
I walk as through a sacred place
Before the colors fade


The Kingdom Has Already Come
I stopped in the church to pray, It was the middle of the day
And I don’t even know if I believe in God
But I laid my soul on the table
and left that place believing I was able
to pull back the curtain old fears had drawn

I was out on the fourth of July
when I saw those kids, and ust had to cry
The whole town was blazing in the summer’s heat
But out in front of a row of rundown shacks
they had that fire hydrant uncapped
baptizing their bodies right there in the street

chorus:
There’s a tree outside my window
It sings when wind blows
I’ve got water and fire
I know sorrow, I feel desire
And could it be that the kingdom has already come

We all see good or bad in everything that we have
But life is waiting just behind that veil
If this will be loved and that will be hated
the soul is left to struggle segregated
Trapped in the harbor too weighed down to sail

repeat chorus


The Night I Learned How Not To Pray
I was laying on my belly in the middle of the living room floor
I was watching “Howdy Doody”
so I’m guessin’ it was right around four
when I saw my baby brother tumblin’ from the top of the stairs
he was lying limp and silent and the blood was tricklin’ through his shiny hair

When my mom saw little brother she said “Hon, you’d better run and get your dad”
Her voice was high and she was shaking so I knew that this was bad
We stood out by the mailbox watchin’ her and dad and brother drive away
and I didn’t waste not time, I got down on my knees right there, and I began to pray

I prayed into the evening, never even took the time to have a bite
I was sure if I prayed hard enough God would make it right
We were at the kitchen table long past bedtime when we finally got that call
And I knew that it was over when my sister slammed that phone against the wall

(chorus)
That was the night I learned how not to pray
Cause God does what he wants to anyway
I never did tell my mother
and I kept it from my sisters and all my brothers
But, that was the night I learned how not to pray

It was forty-one years later when I took my brothers’ picture out of a box
I hung it on the wall, sat across from him and I began to talk
When the evening started I didn’t know what I was going to say
But before the night was over I’d told him all about how I’d learned not to pray

(repeat chorus)


Sing The Delta
So you’re heading down a southern way
Passing through the delta some time today
In my mind pictures line the walls
of a place I used to know and vividly recall
I love you so much and you sure sing good
It would mean so much to me if you would
Sing the Delta a love song for me

It’s the land where the cotton used to grow
that owns a piece of my heart and soul
It’s where my people on both sides going back
eked out a livin’ farmin’ and fillin’ cotton sacks
Dad took us west when I was a little child
But it’s in my blood, flowing strong and wild
Sing the Delta a love song for me

Sing the Delta a love song for me
Lay it down on that river, Let it roll on out to sea
The Delta lived in my mama’s voice and in her hands
It’s a language my spirit understands
Sing the Delta a love song for me

You give it all just the way your daddy does
You both got your demons but they’re cloaked in love
And I know that life’s puttin’ your callin’ to the test
But you’ve got something that sets you right up ‘long side the very best
So take that heart good as heaven every made
And that voice that lays like August in the shade
And sing the Delta a love song for me

Sing the Delta a love song for me
Let it rock that old cradle and roll on out to sea
I’ve been east, I’ve been west and north
From that sweetness I just can’t ever divorce
Sing the Delta a love song for me


If That Ain’t Love
My dad worked at the Movieland Wax Museum
He was the guy who kept the cobwebs off Sophia Loren
Every morning at five he’d get up and go to work
wearing his name across the pocket of his shirt
My mother told me, out back of that place there was a shed
And every chance he could, he’d slip out there and bow his head
While he was praying I was up the road at school
but, I know, my name was presented to the god he was talkin’ to

(chorus)
And if that ain’t love this mountain’s just a hill
If that ain’t love water’s what they’re making in that still
If that ain’t love, the truest kind, if that ain’t love
stars in heaven don’t shine

I’m driving to the drugstore listening to my radio
And there she is, talking to me, the beautiful queen of soul
I pull off on the shoulder, It’s just more than I can stand:
Aretha Franklin singing “Precious Lord Take My Hand”

(repeat chorus)


Livin’ On The Inside
Books are stacked on my table, Books are filling my shelves
Day and night I’ve been trying to unravel myself
But I’ve been looking for answers that don’t seem to want to be had
People don’t live too long when they’re feeling this back

I miss those Labor Day picnics, like the ones that we used to have
When no ones worrying about nothin’, no ones feeling bad
I wanna roll down the hillside and lay dizzy in the cool green grass
And jump around like a frog in a gunny sack

(chorus)
I don’t wanna know about nothin’ unless it’s something I can see or touch
Cause I’ve been living on the inside too much
My friend, she’s got some babies, and she loves them with all of her might
They run her around all day, They keep her up at night
But she can kiss those faces and she’s the one who gets to see them smile
I’m thinking maybe that would beat this by a pretty long mile

(repeat chorus)


Makin’ My Way Back Home
(chorus)
Makin’ my way back home, It’s been the longest time
Not since I was a little child have I felt so good and fine
The easiest thing I’ve ever done, Like walking through an open door
All those things that held me down, well they just don’t matter anymore

I wore pretty dresses and teased my hair
Sang my heart out in those songs
Good or bad, I done my best
You can’t tell me I was wrong

(repeat chorus)

I see the shadows of my life cast upon the level land
Rosy lengthening of day finds my feet in native sand

(repeat chorus)

Mornin’ Glory
(chorus)
Mornin’ glory, fuschia in green
You sweet little Jezebel in my garden of dreams
Petals clenched tightly in the late morning sun
My day is just starting, Your day is done

Apple-green butterfly lites upon you
Once, then again, he calls
trying so hard to get through
He dances and somersaults
then floats away blue
His bold ambition has failed to sway you

(repeat chorus)

Vines wrap the south side-porch
up the lattice they climb
The clothes nearly touch the ground
on that saggin clothes line
Paint’s peeled and screens are torn
I got so much to do
But I’ll steal one minute more
of this glory with you

(repeat chorus)


There’s A Whole Lotta Heaven
There’s a lot of people talkin’ ‘bout getting in the gloryland way
Walkin’ straight and narrow, trying to get to heaven someday
But I’ve been saved by the love of the people livin’ right here
And there’s a whole lotta heaven shinin’ in this river of tears

We don’t have a prophet to tell us what our future holds
We’ve only got each other and the love we carry in our souls
Though this world’s full of trouble and the path we walk is never clear
There’s still this whole lotta heaven shinin’ in a river of tears

(chorus)
There’s a whole lotta heaven shinin’ in this river of tears
If you pull back the curtain little diamonds will appear
You can take your streets of gold if you want ‘em
and your mansion so dear
But I’ll take the whole lotta heaven shinin’ in this river of tears

This life that I’m livin’ is like a ship that don’t want to be steered
Sometimes I wake up in the mornin’ thinkin’ I could buckle
beneath the weight of my own fears
It’s some pain, some strain and some struggle
but I persevere
Cause I got a whole lotta heaven shinin’ in my river of tears

(repeat chorus)


Mama Was Always Tellin’ Her Truth
My mama was always tellin’ her truth
Times were hard and that’s the way she made it through
When it came to her feelins’ there wasn’t a back burner on that stove
Some little somethin’ would go wrong and she might start yellin’ or cryin’
If you didn’t know better you’d think one of us was dyin’
But that was mama and she just told her truth

I would sit in the churchouse right there beside her
Mama would move when the spirit would guide her
Wavin’ her hands up to heaven singin’ her tune
But if the preacher said somethin’ and she didn’t like it
Her head would go to shakin’, she just wouldn’ hide it
That was mama and she just told her truth

When I was a kid comin’ in from school, I said
“Mama I’m so worried something could happen to you!
And if you die, Oh Mama, what am I gonna do?”
She said “Iris, just because I’m older than you,
don’t be sure you won’t go before I do.”
That was mama and she just told the truth

(chorus)
It was my mama who taught me I could tell my truth
And sometimes it’s about all that I can do
Looking in from the outside it may not seem like much
But I’ll tell ya now, if that’s what you’re thinkin,
Your truth can mean the difference between swimmin’ and sinkin’
I thank my mama for tellin’ me her truth

If she was glad she took you with her, If she was sad she took you too
There wasn’t a lot of travellin’ she didn’t do
Right there in that little house was a bigger world
than I may every see
Some people liked, some people didn’t
for some of what she said she may never be forgiven
But that was mama and she just told her truth

Life with my mama could sometimes be a rough road
She could say somethin’ and blood would pour from my soul
But I wouldn’t trade one mile of this journey me and her have been on
Cause I’ve loved my mama like I’ve never loved another
Long as I live there will be no one above her
I know my mama cuz she told me her truth

Life as I know it can be a little confusing
I don’t know the difference between winnin’ and losin’
Everytime I find a line that I can walk on, It slips from view
But when it all goes dark and I start losing vision
I just think about her and I know just what I’m missin’:
I gotta go back to tellin’ my truth

(repeat chorus)

Out of The Fire
On a gravel back road down deep in the Fall
So long ago yet how well I recall
my Grandpa's green truck with the rusted out rims
and me on the seat between my mama and him
How we rattled along until the old Ford, it stalled
and mama said "Jump on out, pick you a big cotton ball"
An Autumn leaf scraped it's way across the road
as we were headin' back home

See the proud, thrusting, curve of the robin's red breast
out gathering worms to return to her nest,
the lavender haze at the first light of dawn,
a woman's clear voice lilting in song,
and all the fine words our poets have said,
the sparkling dew upon the spider's silk web,
Does one matter more? Does one matter less?
Who of us can say?

The tents are rolled up, The revival's left town
All that remains is the fine sawdust ground
still wet with the tears that fell from the eyes
of folks too far down to hang back in pride
And I am there, too, like I always was:
deep in the pain, strong in love
still singing my prayer to heaven above
heartfelt and true

Once you were the dawn, the dusk, and the night
Without the dream of holding you tight
my days turned to black, I could hardly take breath
I stumbled my way through a fate worse than death
But like the Phoenix that rose right out of the fire
I came back too, from a bed of desire
and shook from my wings the ash from the pyre
and headed back home