River Keeps Secrets

The Tennessee's been flowing since before my daddy's time

Carried off the evidence of everybody's crimes

I stand here on the banks where the water turns to black

And wonder what she'd tell me if the river could talk back

Some nights I bring her offerings wrapped in heavy chain

Some nights I just bring whiskey and my guilt and all my pain

She takes it all without a word, no judgment in her eyes

The river keeps secrets better than I keep mine

Oh, the river keeps secrets

Deeper than the grave

The river keeps secrets

Every soul she couldn't save

What you give to the water

Stays beneath the tide

The river keeps secrets

Better than I keep mine

There's a baptism in the drowning if you're brave enough to try

Sometimes redemption looks a lot like learning how to die

I've confessed to her at midnight things

I'd never tell a priest

She absolves me with her current, gives my demons their release

The fishermen pull strange things up but they don't ask no names

The river's got her reasons and the river has no shame

Between Chattanooga and Nashville she's got stories in her mud

Some written out in clay and stone, some written out in blood

Oh, the river keeps secrets

Deeper than the grave

The river keeps secrets

Every soul she couldn't save

What you give to the water

Stays beneath the tide

The river keeps secrets

Better than I keep mine

I asked her once"what's the worst thing you ever seen?"

She just laughed that low and rolling laugh

Said"boy, you don't wanna know what flows through me

I've carried soldiers, sinners, saints, and in-betweens

I've carried children, I've carried dreams

I'm older than your conscience and deeper than your need

I don't judge what people bring me

I just take it out to sea

So I stand here like a penitent with nothing left to hide

The stranger at the water's edge at the turning of the tide

Some men build their churches out of guilt and glass and stone

I built mine out of whiskey, darkness, and this river's undertow

One day I'll walk into her fully clothed and carrying my shame

Let her wash it all away from me or drown me just the same

Either way the river wins, either way she'll set me free

'Cause the river keeps secrets

And one day that secret will be me

Oh, the river keeps secrets

Deeper than the grave

The river keeps secrets

Every soul she couldn't save

What you give to the water

Stays beneath the tide

The river keeps secrets

Better than I keep mine

Yeah, the river keeps secrets

And honey, so do I

But the river keeps them better

'Til the day I die

The river knows...

The river knows...

What the river knows, the river keeps

Down where the current runs deep