In the '51 flood the river got mean
The levee broke at a town downstream
Up on our levee where the county lines meet
Caught a couple of their boys with some TNT
Something had to give and it gave down there
My thoughts are with you but my family's here
It was you this time, it was us before
Nothing's fair in flood and war
And blood's thicker than water
But thin and cold in the flood
The mud and the guilt and the gun get heavy
We do what we gotta
We walk the levee
My sisters married brothers from the neighboring town
My cousin and his boy farm his father's ground
I'm a Christian man with a Bible and a gun
Just praying to God ain't gotta shoot no one
CHORUS
Now I'm just a man protecting his home
Why do I feel like a dog out killing his own
Itchy on the trigger, quick on the draw
Shined a flashlight in the face of a twelve year old kid
Who started crying for his ma
I told him to get on home
I saw him in church on Sunday, heard the minister speak
About Noah and the ark and the other cheek
And Jesus' love and Judas' kiss
I'll think of that tonight on the graveyard shift
CHORUS