Where Grass Won't Grow

The dirt was clay and the color of the blood in me

A twelve-acre farm on a ridge in south Tennessee

We left our sweat all over that land

Behind a mule we watched grow old

Row after row

Trying to grow corn and cotton on ground so poor

That grass won't grow

There was one old store in the holler that we called town

It belonged to a gentle old man named Henry Brown

And he gave us grits in the wintertime

So we could go through the cold

When the winds brought snow

Trying to grow corn and cotton on ground so poor

That grass won't grow

The one I loved walked through those fields with me

A hard-working woman, true as one could be

But then one year, death was going round

And swiftly took its toll

Janie had to go

Now she lies asleep under the ground so poor

That grass won't grow

As I stand here looking over this part of Tennessee

The fields were bare as far as the eye could see

And over the ground where Janie lies

There's a beautiful sight to behold

No one knows

Why there's flowers growin' on ground so poor

That grass won't grow

Why there's flowers growin' on ground so poor

That grass won't grow