Was on the day the cowboys were band from the range   Metal touched the world as a master   They rode their ponies down into cities of gold   To leave them forever after   Now the sun was swollen red and old   The earth it was windy, dark and cold   Where the highway ends the desert takes it toll   So dusty, red and angry   It was a time when men died out on the prairie   From not having a decent friend   At night the ghost to the mode of riders   Was a howlin' canyon winds      You can hear em' cryin'   Good God, I think they're dyin'      When them rangers down in Dallas   Had all but all given' it up and left   And those that hung on hopin'   Was trying their best to, to forget   The way those outlaws and desperados   Right from the cheapest to the best   Rode in on ponies made of skin and bones   Gave up their rusty guns and went back home   And the governor was sent down from population control   And Marshall law was passed   Riverboat gamblers put their money on faith   For the time for hope had passed      In the cold blue light of the desert night   There was a thousand starry ships   And men came down from still I don't know where   With death on their fingertips   Now there's no more kings in Texas   I swear they rounded up each and every one   And old Atlanta Canastoga   Reached from the Rocky Mountains into the old dead sun   Now Anna Maria walks the plains alone   The last of a struggling people   She thinks of all those outlaws who wanted to reach for the skies   And got stuck up on the steeple      Oh, you can hear them cryin'   Good god, I think they're dying'   In the wind lord, you can hear em' sigh