It grows as it goes Through struggle and toil Invaded, unconquered Foreign boots upon the soil Revolt in Santa Fe To arise on Christmas Day Smothered at its birth The Ancients rise again Gray Eminence of Taos Stoking flames of dissent Ceding land, reaping hatred Sickness unto death To the home of the gringo In the dark before sunrise Flinging arrows to rout them Clawing the walls to survive With lightning in their veins War chants on liquored tongues Shot, stabbed, and pierced Bent's scalp baking in the sun Los diablos Americanos Struck in swift reprisal Pursued from hilltop to hilltop To the pueblo at red willows The citadel besieged Raining hellfire and damnation Bursting shells, shrieking wounded Little quarter asked or given A drumhead court-martial In the wake of devastation From a cottonwood in Taos The conquered hung for treason If an injury must be done Let it be so severe That with the passage of time Vengeance need not be feared