Ode To Billie Joe-Nancy Wilson

[00:10.33]It was the third of June, another sleepy, dusty Delta day [00:20.75]I was out choppin' cotton and my brother was balin' hay [00:27.74] [00:31.29]And at dinner time we stopped and walked back to the house to eat [00:37.84] [00:40.96]And Mama hollered out the back door "y'all remember to wipe your feet" [00:47.76] [00:51.70]And then she said "I got some news this mornin' from Choctaw Ridge" [00:57.37] [01:01.49]"Today Billy Joe MacAllister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge" [01:08.37] [01:12.49]And Papa said to Mama as he passed around the blackeyed peas [01:17.48] [01:20.23]"Well, Billy Joe never had a lick of sense, pass the biscuits, please" [01:27.84] [01:32.08]"There's five more acres in the lower forty I've got to plow" [01:38.14] [01:41.38]And Mama said it was shame about Billy Joe, anyhow [01:47.25] [01:51.49]Seems like nothin' ever comes to no good up on Choctaw Ridge [01:58.04] [02:00.48]And now Billy Joe MacAllister's jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge [02:07.15] [02:08.96]And Brother said he recollected when he and Tom and Billie Joe [02:16.89] [02:20.13]Put a frog down my back at the Carroll County picture show [02:25.94] [02:30.93]And wasn't I talkin' to him after church last Sunday night? [02:36.11] [02:39.79]"I'll have another piece of apple pie, you know it don't seem right" [02:45.47] [02:50.40]"I saw him at the sawmill yesterday on Choctaw Ridge" [02:55.14]"And now you tell me Billie Joe's jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge" [03:04.69] [03:09.93]And Mama said to me "Child, what's happened to your appetite?" [03:15.61] [03:18.98]"I've been cookin' all morning and you haven't touched a single bite" [03:24.97] [03:28.77]"That nice young preacher, Brother Taylor, dropped by today" [03:34.33] [03:37.76]"Said he'd be pleased to have dinner on Sunday, oh, by the way" [03:44.12]"He said he saw a girl that looked a lot like you up on Choctaw Ridge" [03:53.48] [03:57.23]"And she and Billy Joe was throwing somethin' off the Tallahatchie Bridge" [04:01.72] [04:07.71]A year has come 'n' gone since we heard the news 'bout Billy Joe [04:14.02]And Brother married Becky Thompson, they bought a store in Tupelo [04:27.43]There was a virus going 'round, Papa caught it and he died last Spring [04:33.55] [04:36.10]And now Mama doesn't seem to wanna do much of anything [04:41.03] [04:45.78]And me, I spend a lot of time pickin' flowers up on Choctaw Ridge [04:51.33] [04:54.70]And drop them into the muddy water off the Tallahatchie Bridge