Text: Mark Erelli. Hope & Other Casualties. Imaginary Wars.

Behind the house where I lived
Back when I was a kid
I played G.I. Joe beneath the tall pine trees
I'd fight imaginary wars
'Til my mom called from our back porch
And I'd come home covered in that pine pitch
From my head down to my knees

Too big to wrap my arms around
Surely older than I could count
Must have been there since the Mayflower crossed the sea
They'd been through blizzards and hurricanes
Summer droughts and freezing rain
Them pines would live forever
At least that's how it seemed to me

CHORUS:
Now what's become of the old pine woods
It's all gone and there's a brand new neighborhood
All for a buck they cut down all those trees
They subdivided all of my fondest memories

When those trucks came for my woods
I did everything I could
And it was war for real when school let out that June
I ripped down flags and I pulled up stakes
But what difference can one boy make
Them pines still fell like thunder on a summer afternoon

CHORUS

And I never became friends
With the families that moved in
They were different from us or so it seemed
I grew up and moved away
I just go home on holidays
But those tall and tangled pines
They're still falling in my dreams

We all want the greenest lawn
And a country club where we belong
And an SUV to get us there in style
But we don't keep track of what we've lost
We can't calculate the cost
When there's no place left for a boy's
Imagination to run wild

So what's become of the old pine woods
It's all gone and it's gone for good
All for a buck they cut down all those trees
They subdivided all of my fondest memories