South Coast Lyrics - Arlo Guthrie

by Lillian Bos Ross, Sam Eskin, Richard Dehr & Frank Miller 

(Arlo's version is from the singing of Ramblin' Jack Elliott) 

My name is Juanano de Castro 

My father was a Spanish Grandee 

But I won my wife in a card game 

To hell with those lords o'er the sea 

CHORUS: 

Well the South Coast is wild coast and lonely 

You might win in a game at Jolon 

But a lion still rules the Barranca 

And a man there is always alone 

in my youth i had a Monterey homestead 

fields,creeks,mountains all mine 

and i built me a snug little shanty 

and i roofed it and floored it with pine 

i had a bronco,buckskin, 

like a bird he flew over the trail 

when we'd ride out 40 miles every friday 

for some grub and to pick up my mail 

I sat in a card game at Jolon 

I played there with an outlaw named Juan 

And after I'd taken his money 

I staked all against his daughter Dawn 

I picked up the ace...l had won her 

My heart it was down at my feet 

Jumped up to my throat in a hurry 

Like a young summer's day she was sweet 

He opened the door to the kitchen 

And he called the girl in with a curse 

Saying "Take her, Goddamn ya, you've won her 

She's yours now for better or worse" 

Her arms had to tighten around me 

As we rode down the hills to the south 

Not a word did I hear from her that day 

Nor a kiss from her pretty red mouth 

well we soon reached the valley of twilight 

and the stars twinkled out over the coast 

she soon loved the valley and the orchards 

but i knew it was me she loved the most 

That was a gay happy winter 

We carved on a cradle of pine 

By the fire in that neat little cabin 

And I sang with that gay wife of mine 

CHORUS 

That night I got hurt in a landslide 

Crushed hip and twice broken bone 

She saddled her pony like lightning 

And rode off for the doctor in Jolon 

The lion screamed in the Barranca 

Buck, he bolted and he fell on the slide 

My young wife lay dead in the moonlight 

My heart died that night with my bride 

they buried her out in the orchard 

carried me up to Jolon 

now i'm left with these memories 

i'm an old broken man all alone 

the cabin still stands on the hillside 

the door open to the rain 

and i'm living up here in Jolon 

and i never can go back there again 

CHORUS