Bonita And Bill Butler Lyrics - Paper Airplane - Alison Krauss & Union Station

I grew up in the scantling yards of Wheeling, West Virginia 

A wheelhouse cub looking for an open door 

In the packet ways a Sweeney wed the keel of my Bonita 

Just two months from her timbers 'til she moored 

I paid the fare in billet on her maiden voyage to Vicksburg 

And talked my way to hand the tiller on the course 

In her planks I carved a notch and sealed the vow 'Be my Bonita' 

And her dowry was my life between the shores 

I was born with rouging ways, and she steered me like a woman 

From the port calls and the bawds that lead me stray 

The calliope serenades, made the old towns come running 

And the boys would gamble shards to pull her chains 

The striker's boast would fain me loss, about the wrecks the shoals were keeping 

And how the old girl's got poor Billy's ransom saved 

On the lake at Bistineau, she set the wharf at Dixie 

With a thousand bales of cotton on her main 

As the great raft disappeared, the watermark went sinking 

And she was stuck right hard, a listing on the bank 

With the furnace still a blaze, I stood my last upon her 

Then climbed the prow and took a landsman's trade 

'A derelict now Milady' said the watch log I've concorded 

'Have the bosun sound us eight bells for the change' 

Cause I was born with rouging ways, and she steered me like a woman 

From the port calls and the bawds that lead me stray 

The calliope serenades, made the old towns come running 

And the boys would gamble shards to pull her chains 

And I would take to wider walks, so the gin I stopped a drinking 

At three scores aloft this crooked frame 

The striker's boast would fain me loss, about the wrecks the shoals were keeping 

And how the old girl's got poor Billy's ransom saved