Livin on the road my friend, is gonna keep you free and clean
Now you wear your skin like iron
Your breath as hard as kerosene

You weren't your momma's only boy, but her favorite
one itseems
She began to cry when you said goodbye

And sank into your dreams
Pancho was a bandit boy, his horse was fast as polished steel
He wore his gun outside his pants

For all the honest world to feel
Pancho met his match you know on the deserts down in Mexico
Nobody heard his dyin words, ah but that's the way it

goes

All the Federales say, they could've had him any day

They only let him slip away, out of kindness I suppose

Lefty he can't sing the blues all night long like he used

to
The dust that Pancho bit down south ended up in Lefty's
mouth

The day they laid poor Pancho low, Lefty split for Ohio
Where he got the bread to go, there ain't nobody knows


All the Federales say, they could've had him any day
They only let him slip away out of kindness I suppose


The boys tell how old Pancho fell, and Lefty's livin in
cheaphotels
The desert's quiet, Cleveland's cold

And so the story ends we're told
Pancho needs your prayers it's true, but save a few for
Leftytoo

He only did what he had to do, and now he's growing old

All the Federales say, they could've had him any day

They only let him slip away out of kindness I suppose

A few gray Federales say, they could've had him any day

They only let him slip away out of kindness I suppose