Steve Earle – The Tennessee Kid lyrics

[Verse 1]
On Mardi Gras day the Tennessee kid
Awoke in a puddle of his own worse fears
Haunted by the ghost of vague remembrance
No corporeal beast he could name
So the kid invoked Lucifer himself
For those most grievously discourteous
And charged him with some myth forth to a town
At the crossroads celebrated in a song, come on

[Verse 2]
Up jumped the devil in the middle of the [?] fair
'Who dares utter my most secret name! ' he roared
But the kid yielded not so much as an inch to uncertainty
Stead bast to rejoin the enemy in kind
'Oh, [?], Satan, Mephistopheles, Beelzebub'
'By any other name you ain't nothin' like a rose'
And they gutted his loins to the ill suited onslaught
The devil only shrugged and the kid shuddered when he heard him say
'Hey hey hey, hey hey hey hey, hey hey hey hey hey'
'Balance comes due some day'

[Verse 3]
'Wait just one goddamn minute! ' cried the kid from the crumbleland [?]
'You've neva mentioned nothin' about no kinda note'
'It just says sign here, it's just a soul, you'll never miss it'
I ain't set foot in no church since I was just a lil old thang
Reckon I would send it straight to hell by the highway
No matter how long and how hard that I prayed
So I might as well make this guitar talk
Somebody said ole' Bob Johnson came down this way
And the devil said
'Hey hey hey hey, hey hey hey, hey hey hey hey'
'Balance comes due some day'

[Verse 4]
And the monster raised himself up to the fullness of his stature
Black wings eclipsing the sandy Mississippi moon
Behold Behemot, the trampler of infidels
He who sweeps away nations with the flick of his tail
Diabulus, The Gripper, Faustus, Paganini, lured and long is the tail of my pray
Question not the iron clad bond of my surety
Sit down here and blood in your very own hand
And the Tennessee kid cast an eye on the list
Where his mark was indeed clearly and described [?]
And he fell to his knees, but it was too late to pray
And with his very last breath he did say
'Hey hey hey hey, hey hey hey, hey hey hey hey'
'The balance comes due some day'