It's not
"the guards in the long white houses"
but
"the gods in the long white houses"

It's possibly my favoriate Tome Paxton song, and from one of my favorite Tom Paxton albums, but I think the publisher went out of business leaving the rights in limbo, so it's never been released on CD. I wore out my vinyl copy long ago, sadly. Worse, becuase the album isn't well know, Tom doesn't sing many of the songs on it often.