Michael Martin Murphey - Rhymes of the Renegades lyrics

If you listen close when the hot wind blows Down the dust filled streets of old tombstone You might hear an old rhyme ringin' Of the legends who walked in their long black coats And their high top boots and their .45 colts Right in to this song I'm singing That the ballad mongers made Into the rhymes of the renegades Way up in Dakota by the deadwood moon Wild Bill's ghost haunts number 10 saloon Where a coward came to get him Bill held a dead man's hand of aces and eights With his back to the door he tempted fate Old Bill never knew what hit him Gamblin' his life away To the rhymes of the renegades And in all of the towns too tough to die They're dancin' up on Boot Hill tonight Laughin' at the movies Hollywood made Dancing to the rhymes of the renegades And Billy the Kid is laughing right out loud At how they turned him into a hero somehow Who'll cast a third stone at his well known grave While chanting these rhymes of the renegades Way out in California by a long dark bend And a mask and duster blowing in the wind Black Bart still stands there waitin' And out in El Paso the thunder cloud rolls Like John Wesley Hardin's guns long ago And the west still loves to hate him For his legend will not fade From the rhymes of the renegades And all of the robbers who rode through hell And danced on the rope when the gallows fell Their demons are still with us And the vigilantes do more evil than good When they masquerade around like robin hood And they ride at night to get us From the owl hoot trails the shades Come the rhymes of the renegades And could it be true that some become outlaws Holdin' on to the last to a long lost cause Diggin' their grave with a silver spade Singing rhymes and rhymes to the renegades Some call it a mystery when waco burns From history they refuse to learn They turn their backs 'till the movie deal's made Deaf to the rhymes of the renegades They'll burn down up to heaven and stay... Cause the raid out laws on the churches and banks... They enforce the laws that where tailor made They won't hear the rhymes of the renegades They ignore the dark side of humanity They're living the illusion that were all free They'll never know how many could be saved From the lessons and the rhymes of the renegades