From the recording Blue Ridge Mountain Time: Songs from Wildacres
Elegy for a Barnyard (2018): this came from one of the Table Rock authors, Luther Kirk, who asked if I might write a song based one of his poems. I looked through his book of poetry, "Child of Appalachia," and was called to his beautiful Elegy Written in an Old Barnyard. I used a special tuning (DADDAD) to mimic the sound of a dulcimer.
Lyrics
The trail tracks ‘cross the broom sedge field
Enters the lone graveyard
wanders nigh the angled stones
passes beyond yon gap
Downslope it spans a slipshod bridge
Downslope it ends in an old barnyard
The coop, the sty, the crib, the barn
Huddle as though in sleep
the shuttered house sloughs off its coat
gazes with deadened eyes
pining it seems for the folks who sleep
pining for the folks who sleep on the steep hillside