This Sacred Land

I’m hard at work each day when the rooster crows at dawn
Scratching out a living on this hundred acre farm
Generations lived and died right here where I stand
Family roots run long and deep beneath this sacred land

My family built this house and barn in 1844
They survived fire and flood and the bullet scars of war
Symbols of a legacy most folks can’t understand
The only life we’ve ever known here on this sacred land

And it’s killing me to think these fields of snowy cotton
Could one day be paved over and in time long forgotten

Year by year the bankers take a little more
And my children wonder what they’re working so hard for
It’s like this fertile soil is slipping through our hands
Till nothin’s left but memories of this sacred land