Dixie Lullaby

My father had skin like leather
 Hands like steel
 From a lifetime spent in the cotton fields
 I know he'd come home tired and dirty
 Almost every night
 He found the strength to smile at me, and hold my mama tight
 While that old transistor radio would play the opry out in the hall
 I'd sit and watch their shadows glide across the wall
 And they'd dance to a Dixie lullaby
 A picture of love beneath the southern sky
 Oh my, what a beautiful life
 Just like a Dixie lullaby
 I left home at 18
 In a hand me down Chevrolet
 Packed my mama's goodness, my old man's stubborn ways
 It was college, work, and love
 Then the babies came
 The youngest one got his granddaddy's name
 And in the early morning hours, when my children could not sleep
 I'd rock them in my arms to a simple beat
 I'd sing them a Dixie lullaby
 Hush baby, don't you start to cry
 Oh my, what a beautiful life
 Just like a Dixie lullaby
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 My father was a mountain of a man
 That was the description that I gave
 The morning that we laid him in his grave
 There, with my mama by his side, we said our last goodbye
 To a man we thought would never die
 As I stood there in the fields of amazing grace
 Oh, how the tears ran down my face
 And I sang him a Dixie lullaby
 We'll meet again, by and by
 Oh my, what a beautiful life
 Just like a Dixie lullaby
 Oh my, what a beautiful life
 Just like a Dixie lullaby