Leave your boots at the door

**(Title: The Guest House Saloon)**

**(Verse 1)**

This old heart is just a boarding house

With a creaky porch and a flickering light

Every morning, sunup to sundown

Some new feeling pulls in off the night

Joy rolls in like a summer rainstorm

Grief pulls up in a cloud of dust

Fear comes knocking, looking lonesome

And love just leaves my hinges rust

**(Chorus)**

So pull up a chair, leave your boots at the door

I ain't turning nobody away no more

Even the heartache that rattles my bones

Is just a guest in this house of my own

So I'll pour you a whiskey, I'll swallow the sting

'Cause even the darkness has something to sing

The landlord upstairs knows just what He's doin'

So I'll welcome 'em all to this guest house I'm ruin'

**(Verse 2)**

That old shame came barging in here

Kicked my furniture clean to the floor

I thought He'd come to steal my last dollar

Turns out He was just clearing space for more

That mean-mouthed malice I was hiding from

Sat right down and ordered a beer

Said, "Boy, I ain't your enemy truly,

I'm just the mirror you been too scared to peer"

**(Chorus)**

So pull up a chair, leave your boots at the door

I ain't turning nobody away no more

Even the heartache that rattles my bones

Is just a guest in this house of my own

So I'll pour you a whiskey, I'll swallow the sting

'Cause even the darkness has something to sing

The landlord upstairs knows just what He's doin'

So I'll welcome 'em all to this guest house I'm ruin'

**(Bridge)**

I spent my whole life locking the gate

Afraid of who might show up late

But the Man who built this wooden frame

Sends every soul for my own good name

So if you're sorrow, if you're grace

Stay a while and know your place

Right beside me at this table

Long as you are here, I'm able

**(Final Chorus - slowed down, spoken/sung)**

So pull up a chair... leave your boots at the door...

I ain't turning nobody away... no more...

Even the heartbreak that rattles my bones...

Is just a guest... in this house of my own...

**(Outro)**

Yeah, the landlord upstairs...

He knows just what He's doin'...

So I'll sit right here...

And let the whole world come through...in.

---

There you go. Rumi meets Willie Nelson at a dive bar in Texas. Same truth, different hat. Want me to add a harmonica solo or change up the key?