 The song's storyline deals with the narrator's desire for Clowers' daughter and his intention to climb the titular mountain and marry her.It opens with the recounting of a legendary warning to the listener not to "go on Wolverton Mountain", as its inhabitant Clifton Clowers, who is "handy with a gun and a knife", poses a lethal threat to anyone who tries to approach his beautiful daughter, whose "tender lips are sweeter than honey".If a stranger attempts to enter, Clowers is alerted by "the bears and the birds".