Lyle Lovett Follow

Mary Martin was a schoolgirl just seventeen or so
When she married Billy Archer about fourteen years ago
Not even out of high school folks said, ‽It wouldn't last”
But when you grow up in the country you grow up mighty fast

They married in a hurry in March before school was out
Folks said that she was pregnant "Just wait and you'll find out"
It came about that winter one gray November morn
The first of many more to come a baby boy was born

And cattle is their game
And Archer is the name they give to the acres that they own
Well if the Brazos don't run dry and the newborn calves they don't die
Another year from Mary will have flown
Another year from Mary will have flown

And now Billy kept what cattle his daddy could afford
As went bouncing across the cactus in a 1950 ford
But the cows were sick and skinny and the weed was all that grew
But Billy kept the place alive the only thing he knew

And Mary cooked the supper and Mary scrubbed the clothes
And Mary busted horses and blew the baby's nose
And Mary and a shotgun kept the rattlesnakes away
And how she kept on smiling no one could ever say

And cattle is their game
And Archer is the name they give to the acres that they own
If the Brazos don't run dry and the newborn calves don't die
Another year from Mary will have flown
Another year from Mary will have flown

Now the drought of '57 was a curse upon the land
No one in Bosque County could give Bill a helping hand
The ground was cracked and broken and the truck was out of gas
And cows can't feed on prickly pear instead of growing grass

Well the weather got the water and a snake bite took a child
And a fire in the old barn took the hay that Bill had piled
The mortgage got the money and the screw worm got the cows
The years have come for Mary, she's waiting for them now

And cattle is their game
And Archer is the name they give to the acres that they own
If the Brazos don't run dry and the newborn calves they don't die
Another year from Mary will have flown
Another year from Mary will have flown

Six o'clock silence of a new day begin is heard in the small Texas town
Like a signal from nowhere the people lived their
Then up and down moving around
'Cause this began to fry and the biscuits to bake
On the store left the salvation out or you won't take
You open the windows and u turn on the fan
'Cause it's harder then hill when the sun hits the ground