I met her in the springtime.
She was racing down the canyons.
I longed to make her spirit mine,
So I left my old companions.
I learned to read her restless moods,
To keep myself from harm.
I learned to watch for jagged rocks
Underneath the calm.

CHORUS
The river is a woman,
With milk-white hair that falls and flows.
The river is a woman.
She's easy to love, but hard to know.
The river guards her freedom.
She can't be true to any man,
And I love this wild woman
Men call the Rio Grande.

She lived here long before I came,
Ten million years and counting.
Together with the wind and rain
She tore her way through mountains.
And still her work is never done,
By morning, night or noon.
She's got to bring more mountains down,
And make more deserts bloom.

I make my living running rafts.
I show her off to strangers.
Sometimes I just have to laugh,
When they ask about the dangers.
I tell them she can break my bones,
But I always will forgive her.
And if, some day, she won't let go,
I want to come back as a river.