(Bobbie Gentr)
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It was the third of June, another sleepy, dusty Delta day
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I was out choppin' cotton and my brother was balin' hay
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And at dinner time we stopped and walked back to the house to eat
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And Mama hollered out the back door "y'all remember to wipe your feet"
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And then she said "I got some news this mornin' from Choctaw Ridge"
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"Today Billy Joe MacAllister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge"
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'n' Papa said to Mama as he passed around the blackeyed peas
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"Well Billy Joe never had a lick of sense, pass the biscuits, please"
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"There's five more acres in the lower forty I've got to plow"
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'n' Mama said it was shame about Billy Joe, anyhow
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Seems like nothin' ever comes to no good up on Choctaw Ridge
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And now Billy Joe MacAllister's jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge
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'n' Brother said he recollected when he and Tom and Billie Joe
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Put a frog down my back at the Carroll County picture show
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And wasn't I talkin' to him after church last Sunday night?
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"I'll have another piece-a apple pie, you know it don't seem right"
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"I saw him at the sawmill yesterday on Choctaw Ridge"
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"And now ya tell me Billie Joe's jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge"
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'n' Mama said to me "Child, what's happened to your appetite?"
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"I've been cookin' all morning and you haven't touched a single bite"
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"That nice young preacher, Brother Taylor, dropped by today"
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"Said he'd be pleased to have dinner on Sunday, oh, by the way"
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"He said he saw a girl that looked a lot like you up on Choctaw Ridge"
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"And she and Billy Joe was throwing somethin' off the Tallahatchie Bridge"
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A year has come 'n' gone since we heard the news 'bout Billy Joe
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'n' Brother married Becky Thompson, they bought a store in Tupelo
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There was a virus going 'round, Papa caught it and he died last Spring
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And now Mama doesn't seem to wanna do much of anything
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And me, I spend a lot of time pickin' flowers up on Choctaw Ridge
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And drop them into the muddy water off the Tallahatchie Bridge
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Ode To Billie Joe
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| Bobbie Gentry |
