Mama come in from the kitchen
She tells me to fetch my brother
She wipes her hand on her apron
And says, "Don't be late for supper"
I walk out on the front porch
The sun's about to die
It's still so hot the old dogs wouldn't bark
Even if a car's to drive by
There's a blue-green Buick and a flat-black Ford jacked up off the ground
Daddy's sittin' on a stump and he's lookin' bewildered at the parts lyin' all around
We ain't been no where at all since the Fairlane threw a rod
Whatever it is, is bein' damned to hell by my daddy and God
Some are here workin' on a passage to Heaven
And others, they can't carry that load
A few are left singin' the blues on Purgatory Road
It's just a mile or so to the edge of town
There ain't much of one here now since the factories closed down
You got no jobs, you got no people, and you got no businesses
The only thing left is the Kingdom Hall of Jehovah's Witnesses
Mama she took me to church one time, gon' get me baptized
Further on down the road, somethin' I realized
Now you might say it's contempt prior to investigation
But nobody seems concerned about their savior's procrastination
Some are here workin' on a passage to Heaven
And others, they can't carry that load
A few are left singin' the blues on Purgatory Road
Now just past the cemetery with its tumped-over tombstones
There's a little tavern that's called the Devil's Backbone
It's got your distilled spirits and Tennessee sour mash
And a little sign that says "In God we trust, all others pay cash"
My brother's sittin' on a chair in front of an old tweed amplifier
He's playing bottle-neck slide, steel on wire
Now when his mother died and his daddy left, my momma she brought him home
And even though he wasn't blood, she raised him as her own
So now he sings them blues on an old Gibson 160E
And he don't even know what color he is 'cause he can't see
Some are here workin' on a passage to Heaven
And others, they can't carry that load
A few are left singin' the blues on Purgatory Road
