☝️ Key Points
- The song tells the story of a dying cowboy who foresees his impending death and reflects on his past mistakes
- He asks the narrator to perform certain customs for his funeral, including six cowboys as pallbearers and six dancers as pallbearers
- The dying cowboy wishes for roses to be scattered on his coffin to muffle the sound of the falling earth
- He asks the narrator to write a letter to his mother and inform her of his death, without mentioning the name of the man who killed him
- At the end of the song, the cowboy is buried and his grave remains marked to this day. The song ends with the melancholic melody the cowboy wished for his funeral
Interpretation
The song 'Streets of Laredo' by
Johnny Cash tells the story of a dying cowboy in the town of Laredo. The narrator encounters the cowboy, wrapped in linen and knowing he is going to die: 'I'm shot in the breast and I know I must die.' The cowboy reminisces about his past, when he was alive and full of energy, but through wrong choices found his downfall.
He asks the narrator to fetch six cowboys to carry his coffin and six dancers to lift his bier. He wishes for roses to be scattered on his coffin to muffle the sound of the clods as they fall: 'Throw bunches of roses all over my coffin. Roses to deaden the clods as they fall.'
He also asks for the drum to be beaten slowly and the fife to be played softly as he is taken to a green valley where he is to be buried. He confesses that as a young cowboy he has done wrong: 'I'm a young cowboy and I know I've done wrong.'
The dying cowboy asks the narrator to write a letter to his gray-haired mother and inform her of his death, but without mentioning the name of the man who killed him.
At the end of the song, the cowboy is buried and his grave is marked to this day. The song ends with the same sad melody the cowboy wanted for his funeral: 'We beat the drum slowly and played the Fife lowly, played the dead march as we carried him along.'
Overall, 'Streets of Laredo' is a melancholic ballad about regret, death, and the harsh life of a cowboy.