Well I packed all of my things into this blanket

The coldest year to earn coyote's fare

Kiss my wife and kids goodbye choke back the quiver in my breath

And took my first steps into this corridor of death



If I'm lucky I will make it to a train

With 500 of my brothers, I would share the strain

standing in this boxcar praying for rain

It's the only the way we will quench our thirst



[Chorus:]

In these gardens of white crosses

Growing in the California sand

In these gardens of white crosses

We are the children of poverty trying to a make a stand



If we make it past the border, we will scatter

Vanish just like smoke in autumn wind

I will run until my color will not matter

Hopin' I can find some work or possibly a friend



There are others who have made it here

They will show me how to find a job and a place to lay my head

And I cannot be concerned with dreams of my children

For there are 5 others in line for my bed



[Chorus:]

In these gardens of white crosses

Growing in the California sand

In these gardens of white crosses

We are the children of poverty trying to a make a stand



I will gladly pick your peaches or clean your hotel rooms

I will do the jobs American won't do

With their cell phones to their heads and $700 dollar shoes

I will risk my life ‘cause it's all I have to lose



Let the devil in the mountains promise me a ride

Found an 18 wheeler and put all of us inside

And just outside of victory, 19 of us died

None of our bodies hit the floor



And so my wife she still wonders when I'm coming home

The riches that I promised her for leaving her alone

I said I would send her all that I could save

But I ended up in California in an unknown grave



[Chorus:]

In these gardens of white crosses growing in the California sand

In these gardens of white crosses we are the children of poverty trying to a make a stand

[repeat]