Who was my mother Who was my father All I've known is a whip upon my back My skin is yellowed by much more than weakness And wise beyond the years of the blue and the black My arms were never strong enough to stir mola**es My eyes watch riverboats as they go by Some call me mistress, but I wish that I was cargo Floating down the Brazos in that chariot to the sky Oh Rachel, won't you lie next to me Tonight and every night to come And won't you calm all that's raging inside me Cause outside's just a battlefield that Santa Ana won My people, they worked from can't see to can't see Traded in and out from the gra**y shores They say there's something about me Flying like a bird Never known freedom before I wear dresses of silks and threaded satins Some gowns were only meant to bear a woman's breast I'll stand down every white man in this county But Columbus, you are dying And I'm no different from the rest Oh Rachel, won't you lie next to me Tonight and every night to come And won't you calm all that's raging inside me Cause outside's just a battlefield that Santa Ana won I was born in the hills of Kentucky But never native to the auction block arrest Headed Southbound as a captive in this country Just like the cowboys drove their cattle through the West You can read all our names in the records You can deny all the days as they go down There's a brick-laid pathway calling you to find us Underneath a golf course in an east Texas town Oh Rachel, won't you lie next to me Tonight and every night to come And won't you calm all that's raging inside me Cause outside's just a battlefield that Santa Ana won Santa Ana won Santa Ana won