John Philip Griffith Lyrics

Nanci Griffith John Philip Griffith

He was a simple man only to a stranger.
And the kindness in his eyes
I still remember.
Now that he is old,
they say he's angry and he's cold,
That his soul is dying.

He's a wealthy man's dream,
and he's a working man's dime.
He has stood in both men's shoes
in his own damn time.
The hard times of the thirties
still linger in his mind
When he is lonely.
He's out there in the cold,
twenty years away from home.
Does he dream about his old home
in San Antone?
He's often watched the highways,
but he's a man of sixty-five.
Where ain't a soul in El Paso
who would give an old drunk a ride.

Now, he traded in his draftsman's pen
for a fishing pole.
And his mansion on the hill
is an alley in El Paso.
The anchors of the fifties
still hold to broken dreams
When his sorrows grow.

He's out there in the cold,
twenty years away from home.
Does he dream about his old home
in San Antone?
He's often watched the highways,
but he's a man of sixty-five.
There ain't a soul in El Paso
who would give an old drunk a ride.

Now, they tell me that John Philip
loved to gamble in his day.
And he burned his bridges well
when he walked away.
He closed those corporate doors,
left his children and his home . . .
Now no one owns him.