The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #51310   Message #780956
Posted By: GUEST,guest
10-Sep-02 - 10:54 PM
Thread Name: Origins: Town of Old Dolores (James Grafton Rogers
Subject: Lyr Add: THE TOWN OF OLD DOLORES
Utah Phillips changed it. Here it is from Katie Lee's book, Ten Thousand Goddam Cattle.

THE TOWN OF OLD DOLORES

In the country down blow where the little piñons grow,
And it's nearly always half a day to water
There used to stand a town where a crick come tumblin' down
From a mesa where she sure hadn't oughter;
Her streets were bright with candle light,
The whole town joined a chorus,
And every man in sight let his cattle drift at night,
Just to mosey to the town of Old Dolores;

And the scented smoke that came
From the piñon wood aflame
Smelt like incense to our Lady of Mañana.
But the 'dobe walls are gone
And the goat bells at dawn
Ain't a jinglin'in the streets of Old Dolores.
And the strings of peppers hung
On the house fronts in the sun,
Blazin' red as some young puncher's new bandana.
There us't to stand a town,
Where a crick come tumblin' down,
From a mesa where she surely hadn't oughta.
And if there's any little well
Down inside the Gates of hell
Why I know the boys have named it Old Dolores.
The greaser girls that fool
On the Plaza- in the cool
There was one, I us't to meet her by a willer,
But the friendly lights are dark,
And the coyote's lonesome bark
Is the only music now in Old Dolores.

I know this was posted, in better form, in a thread here, but it takes too much time to find anything posted in about the last two years.
Hope this helps. I have a little piece of property in the Ortiz Mountains with a high point from which I can see the old Trail; Old Dolores would be visible from its candle and coal oil flames in the night, but now the lights of Santa Fé add a reddish tinge to the sky, the city encroaching ever closer as the rolling country is divided into little ranchitas and "estates," and the imagination doesn't stretch out as it us't to.
The crick tumblin' down from where it hadn't oughta is a figment of Rogers imagination, but there were springs nearby.