Billy Gray rode into Gantry way back in '83
There he first met with young Sarah Maclane
The wild rose of morning, the pale flower of dawning
Hurled a springtime into Billy's life that day

Sarah she could not see the daylight of reality
In her young eyes Billy bore not a flaw
Knowing not her chosen one, he was a hired gun
Wanted in Kansas City by the law

Then one day a tall man came riding from the Badlands
That lie to the north of New Mexico
He was overheard to say, he was looking for a Billy
Gray
A wanted man and a danger said law

Wеll the news it came creeping to Billy fast sleeping
There in the Clarendon Bar and Hotel
He ran to the old church that lies on the outskirts
Thinking he'd hide in the old steeple bell

But a rifleball came flying, face down he lay dying
There in the dust of the road where he lay
Sarah ran to him, she was cursing the lawman
The poor girl knew no reason, except that he'd been
Killed
Sarah still lives in that old white frame house
Where she first met Billy some forty years ago
But the wild rose of morning has faded with the dawning
Of each day of sorrow the long years have grown

And written on the stone where the dusty winds have
Long blown
Eighteen words to a passing world say
"True love knows no season, no rhyme or no reason
Justice is cold as the Granger County clay. "

"True love knows no season, no rhyme or no reason
Justice is cold as the Granger County clay. "