Still working on recording this one

Image: White sharecropper couple near Hartwell, Georgia Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information Black and White Negatives, U.S. Library of Congress LC-USF34- 018096-C

Lyrics:

I pulled my ring from a calloused hand sir
Went and pawned it for our daily bread
We took our vows with dreams of for richer
But we must make do with for poorer instead

That July sun on my naked finger
Burnt near bad enough to kill a man
Walking up them steps where my wife is waiting
When I’ve paid the rent with our wedding band

Summertime when we were younger
Was a time for laughter, the sweet joys of life
Summer ’29 is one long disaster—time for hungry kids and a sobbing wife

August came and we prayed for rain sir, prayed for rain that didn’t fall
It’s a goddamned shame there’s no escaping: wind and sun’s damned us one and all

Fire tore across the grasslands, but if you ask me it’s just as well
Note’s coming due soon on our homestead—
Bank wants my land, sir, I’d rather give ‘em hell

Summer ’29 took all our chances, dried them up, blew them away
If I live to see one hundred I’m never gonna feel the same again about a summer’s day