Del Barber (composer and performer; album: Praireography, 2014)

Blinded by the city lights

No one can see you stallin'

It's been so long since you've seen the prairie stars

You're not sure you can recall them

But there is something here for you to find

You may have found it once and lost it now

We used to fly through the woods

On the backs of quarter horses

Pickin' dandelion bouquets for our sister and our mother

We felt like men but we were boys

Too young to know

That we were as free as fire

And you're lost out in the Big Smoke

Lookin' for a way home

There are no straight paths

There's no easy way

Brother do you remember

That one September morning we were shooting cans

With Dad's .22 without a worry or a warning

You pulled the trigger down and dropped that deer

And you looked at me with tears in your eyes

And I never in a million years

Thought that you'd make that shot

And I picture you tonight, with your sights still on something so far off

Wherever you are I hope you're being careful

About the things you think you want

And you're lost out in the Big Smoke

Without a fire of your own

There are no straight paths

There's no easy way

(Last year, father and son produced 12,000 bussels. Under the Crow, they paid thirteen cents a bussel to ship it to Vancouver: $1560. Within four years they'll likely be paying twice as much and within a decade maybe five times as much."If the price of grain would increase, I suppose a guy wouldn't feel it quite so badly; but on the horizon we don't see it, an increase.""Supposing they, ah, say that a few towns down the road - that grain should be here. There goes our elevator and I would think that 20% of the taxes in this town come from the elevators.)

The sky is getting hazy

It's filling up with grain dust

And it could be in a year the bank finally gets the best of us

But our cows are fed and the bins are full

We're hoping to see you before the snow

You're lost out in the Big Smoke

Without a fire of your own

There are no straight paths

There's no easy way

You're lost out in the Big Smoke

Without a fire of your own

There are no straight paths

There's no easy way