June of 78 Who are you, so arrayed On the banks of the lake adair? Pale lacuna agape And like the Moon in the lake You are not there My poor canary At uncertain behest Maggie’d blown to the west In a shimmering dust of gold With her pale yellow hair They would call her Canary And I loved my Maggie so And that is all you need to know But women here ain’t ever glad Not even Emma Nevada Coming back to share her wedding cake! Women hеre ain’t ever free (And Emma nеver left) we never leave We never last, we never ask, we never stake A claim, or complain, or take Not till I made a play For a parcel that lay On the amador county line Had a notion that I’d Find employ by-and-by At the lonesome willow mine But they don't enlist my kind In the meantime Set to prospecting where I was able And laying my Maggie a table And when it was warm, we would pan When it stormed, play vingt-et-un And when it was cold, they’d come sniffing, with gold in their hands! On and on and again On and on and again You do what you can Take an eighth of an ounce in allowance for my tax, only a dance If alone and abandoned and cast aside, you know the pastor tried in vain to ask her hand Even he! Well, everybody did And I had a plan But they had to sign away my mine And the deed left us free to scrape and bleed and go to seed and never marry Not canary, canary, canary, canary, canary, canary, canary, canary, canary, canary In the spring of that year When the tinker was here Gals would hire him to mend their tin I heard ‘em swarm from afar Like a storm in a jar Like a choir of cherubim Singing hymn, hymn, hymns Whispering, Maggie had gone Must have skipped with someone! Sounded wrong, though it did seem fair April turned into may And I looked every day for you, Maggie Till I heard they found a whore with the golden hair On the shores of the lake Adair On the sluice she was spread Loose, and languid, and dead From the kindness that she had shown Still she told me her tale Lifting veil after veil To expose a grin upon My yellow rose [?] and the lowing blow And thought I longed to believe As I muddied my sleeve And I studied the wicked hap And I longed to revive She was never alive, but by the grace, and the will, and the wheel, and the yen And the wickedness of men! But what to do then? I hauled myself up from the shore, and I called at the door of the foreman I told him and he laughed! So, alas, there was savagery then! Left a hole in his heart you could roll A cabbage in! (a cabbage?!) (Oh no, no! Just a little one, Maggie! Just a little one!) On and on and again ’Till they saw what I am And I am never done. I am never done Went inside for the light Got a paper and a pen Where to begin? Do you sue for the rights, route for the strike Through the alluvium to where it heeds For putting to the end of the lure of the deed The noose on a live oak tree bent over the saloon tent and meant for Me and Maggie! And though it wasn’t him It could’ve been him Or anyone who had done What I know so many men intended when they came or went They came and went So arrogant, arrogant, arrogant, arrogant, arrogant, arrogant, arrogant, arrogant, arrogant, arrogant Held a cloth to my hands Taking stock of my plans Well, there was something I had to make right I took his old buggy whip And I lowered his skip In the glow of the sodium lights With a load of dynamite Maggie said: I am here And with a touch on the ear After thirty years down in the mines Help me lead out the mules Help me free the poor fools Let them see for the very first time They were blind, blind, blind Then we rode for the rift And we bent genuflect And she opened her neck like a squid I saw the father appear Heard her sob in my ear Like a mob of cherubim Howling: Him! Him! It was him! It was him So I threw a charge down the shaft In a cart with the pastor who spat and evangelized He was the last and the worst Canary always goes first To sing where the waters rise Hear her sing. (go on now, Maggie!) On and on, on and on, on and on and again And on and on On and on and again! On and on and again! Then a knock on the wall And a knock and they all fall in And down and in And down and in And we pass away But we pass it on like a baton Down in the mine And so they return Pull the pumps, fill the sumps [?] something they will never learn They will never learn And even if the churn drill, and the stamp mill, and the Pelton wheel And the smoking furnace, all a’burning, overturning, learning She will never breathe The air again, air again, air again, air again, air again, air again Air again, air again, air again, air again, air again, air again Like the screech of a flare Or like they’re reaching for air Beneath the smothering eiderdown Veins of gold still outstretch In a silent arrest For miles and miles around And if I'm underground Then let me join in that line And let me toil in that mine Let me find what is hiding there Let me dig where I durst Let me drink when I thirst And let me breathe the peril air [?] And breathe for my canary And breathe Let me breathe Let me breathe for my canary Breathe for my canary, canary, canary Breathe for my (Canary always calls first!) Breathe for my canary, canary, canary, canary Breathe for my (Canary always calls first!) Breathe for my canary, canary, canary, canary Breathe for my (Canary always calls first!) Breathe for my canary, canary, canary, canary