Below - Slaid Cleaves

There’s an old dirt road, just off route nine

Fades into the lake, at the low water line

Sometimes I wander down that road alone

Remembering the town, that I once called home

I grew up in the valley, every neighbor a friend

Until the modern world started creeping in

One day came the lawyers, with cash in hand

They swore that our village would light up the land

The dusky waters move cold and slow

And the ghosts of a village still wander below

Homesteads of families and friends forever more

Haunting the valley below this sparkling shore

Surrounding the valley was a painted red line

Drawn by company men like marking a crime

A silent reminder that all inside it must go

Or be lost to the rising dead river’s flow

Some folks took the money, started grinding gears

While the rest of us held out, twenty odd years

We watched our town, like a photograph fade

As the company came, to take it all away

They tore down the church, the schoolhouse burned

They dug up the graves, the wheels of progress turned

They got Dutchie’s store, and Haven’s pool hall

When the dozers rolled, it shattered us all

The dusky waters move cold and slow

And the ghosts of a village still wander below

Homesteads of families and friends forever more

Haunting the valley below this sparkling shore

Old May Savage stayed as long as she could

Her house on the hill towered over the flood

It rose up alone, in the dark of night

Its face on the water, the cold moonlight

I shake off the memories, on my lips a prayer

Thanks for the grace, and the beauty down there

And while the porch lights glow, all over the state

There’s nothing but darkness, under the lake

The dusky waters move cold and slow

And the ghosts of a village still wander below

Homesteads of families and friends forever more

Haunting the valley below this sparkling shore

They haunt the valley below this sparkling shore