When I was a young man beginnin' my teens   How well I remember the lickin's I'd get cause I'd dream   My work never finished, barely begun   I couldn't get started till all of my dreamin' was done      I wouldn't shuck cotton', I wouldn't chop wood   And Pa would whip me and say that's for bein' no good   But I kept chasin' rainbows, finally I found   The great open range and the hills were my best dreamin' ground      When I left the home place our Mother did cry   She begged me to stay there and not say goodbye   My Pa told my Mother, your tears are in vain   Your son is a dreamer and the winds call his name      So don't try to stop him, let him move on   'Cause he won't stop his driftin'   Till all of his dreamin' is gone      Last night in a campfire a face I did see   A vision of Mother, she seemed to be callin' to me   For seventeen years now, I've drifted alone   But I wanna see Mother, tomorrow I start driftin' home      The last hill I've climbed now, and what do I see   An old run down shack where the ranch used to be   Then I see a tombstone and then see one more   I drifted too long from the old ranch house door      There's nothin' more left now but driftin', it seems   But I hope I can dream of the lickin's I'd get   'Cause I'd dream