A Cowboy's Prayer

Lord, I've never lived where churches grow.
I loved creation better as it stood
that day you finished it so long ago,
and looked upon your work and called it good.

I know that others find you in the light
that sifted down through tinted window panes,
and yet I seem to feel you near tonight -
in this dim, quiet starlight on the plains.

I thank you, Lord, that I'm placed so well
that you've made my freedom so complete
that I'm no slave to whistle, clock or bell,
nor weak eyed prisoner of Waller Street.

Just let me live my life as I've begun,
and give me work that's open to the sky.
Make me a partner of the wind and sun,
and I won't ask a life that's soft or high.

Let me be easy on the man that's down;
let me be square and generous with all.
I'm careless sometimes, Lord, when I'm in town.
But never let them say I'm mean or small.

Make me as big and open as the plains,
and honest as the horse between my knees -
clean as a wind that blows behind the rains,
free as the hawk that circles down the breeze.

Forgive me, Lord, if sometimes I forget;
you know about the reasons that are hid.
You understand the things that gall or fret;
well, you knew me better than my mother did.

Just keep an eye on all that's done or said,
and right me sometimes when I turn aside.
And guide me on that long, dim trail ahead
that stretched upward toward the great divide

Oh, bury me not on the lone prairie.
These words came low and mournfully
from the pallid lips of a youth who lay
on his dying bed at the close of day.

Oh, bury me not and his voice failed there;
but we took no heed to his dying prayer.
In a shallow grave - just six by three -
we buried him there on the lone prairie.

-Johnny Cash