He lay his blanket underneath the freeway   As the evening sky grew dark   Took a sniff of toncho from his coke can   And headed through Balboa Park   Where the men in their Mercedes   Come nightly to employ   In the cool San Diego evening   The services of the border boys      He grew up near the Zona Norte   With the hustlers and smugglers he hung out with   He swallowed their balloons of cocaine   Brought 'em across the Twelfth Street strip   Sleeping in a shelter   If the night got too cold   Runnin' from the migra   Of the border patrol      Past the salvage yard 'cross the train tracks   and in through the storm drain   they stretched their blankets out 'neath the freeway   and each one took a name   there was X-man and Cochise   Little Spider his sneakers covered in river mud   they come north to California   end up with the poison in their blood      He did what he had to do for the money   sometimes he sent home what he could spare   the rest went to high-top sneakers and toncho   and jeans like the gavachos wear      One night the border patrol swept Twelfth Street   a big car come fast down the boulevard   spider stood caught in its headlights   got hit and went down hard   As the car sped away Spider held his stomach   limped to his blanket 'neath the underpass   lie there tasting his own blood on his tongue   closed his eyes and listened to the cars   rushin' by so fast