What with three babies born, the work was cut down
To a half a day's shift with no reason
The drag lines an' the shovels they was a-humming
As I waited for the sun to go sinking
Tell you now that the whole town is empty
The same as my father before him
The stores one by one they're a-foldin'
Then the shaft was soon shut and more work was cut
And the fire in the air, it felt frozen
Oh, the years passed again and the givin' was good
To marry John Thomas, a miner
'Til a man come to speak and he said in one week
They say that your ore ain't worth digging
Where the miners work almost for nothing
My children will go as soon as they grow
My friends, they couldn't have been kinder
And I's left alone with three children
In the north end of town, my own children are grown
Well, I was raised on the other
'Til one day my brother failed to come home
Then one morning's wake, the bed it was bare
That number eleven was closin'
When the sad, silent song made the hour twice as long
This silence of tongues it was building
So the mining gates locked and the red iron rotted
And I was brought up by my brother
And my schooling was cut as I quit in the spring
Well, a long winter's wait from the window I watched
I lived by the window as he talked to himself
The iron ore poured as the years passed the door
They complained in the east, they are paying too high
With the lunch bucket filled every season
And the room smelled heavy from drinking
But the cardboard filled windows and old men on the benches
The summer is gone, the ground's turning cold
That it's much cheaper down in the South American towns
In the wee hours of youth my mother took sick
