The Rusty Bull – John Grant

On the way out of town on Old Walton Road
There’s a twenty foot rusty bull
With a ring right through it’s nose
If you ask all the folks in town
Some of them remember but
Most of them don’t
He guards the entrance to the junkyard
Where my daddy goes

His eyes fill my heart with dread
And he visits me while I lie in my bed
He says “Your daddy can’t undo what’s done”
And forty years later I’m still trying to run
I wake her up in the middle of the night
I plead with her and I present my plight
But I see a weary melancholy in her face
And I understand that the bull is right

And the stairs still creak at the Five and Dime
And it smells like something set apart from time
And I see you smiling at the Tastee-Freez
And the Sun’s goin’ down behind the Maple trees
And the stairs still creak at the Five and Dime
And it smells like something set apart from time
And I see you smiling at the Tastee-Freez
And the Sun’s goin’ down behind the Maple trees

Now the bull stands under ice and snow
And the Winter offers no reprieve
The moon is tangled up in the branches of the trees
And he won’t let me leave
Spring is the promise that never came
The bull tightens his grip and I curse his name
Now every morning is a harsh reminder
That everything is the same

And the stairs still creak at the Five and Dime
And it smells like something set apart from time
And I see you smiling at the Tastee-Freez
And the Sun’s goin’ down behind the Maple trees
And the stairs still creak at the Five and Dime
And it smells like something set apart from time
And I see you smiling at the Tastee-Freez
And the Sun’s goin’ down behind the Maple trees