"Ode To Billie Joe" Lyrics

It was the third of June, another sleepy, dusty Delta day.
I was out choppin' cotton and my brother was balin' hay.
And at dinner time, we stopped and walked back to the house to eat
And Mama hollered out the back door "Y'all remember to wipe your feet"
And then she said "I got some news this mornin' from Choctaw Ridge.
"Today, Billie Joe MacAllister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge.

And Papa said to Mama as he passed around the blackeyed peas
"Well, Billie Joe never had a lick of sense! Pass the biscuits, please!
There's five more acres in the lower forty I've got to plow."
And Mama said "It was shame about Billie Joe, anyhow!
Seems like nothin' ever comes to no good up on Choctaw Ridge
And now, Billie Joe MacAllister's jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge."

And Brother said he recollected when he and Tom and Billie Joe
Put a frog down my back at the Carroll County picture show.
And wasn't I talkin' to him after church last Sunday night?
"I'll have another piece of apple pie, you know it don't seem right.
I saw him at the sawmill yesterday on Choctaw Ridge
And now, you tell me Billie Joe's jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge."

And Mama said to me "Child, what's happened to your appetite?
I've been cookin' all morning and you haven't touched a single bite
That nice young preacher, Brother Taylor, dropped by today
Said he'd be pleased to have dinner on Sunday! Oh! By the way!
He said he saw a girl that looked a lot like you up on Choctaw Ridge
And she and Billie Joe was throwing
Somethin' off the Tallahatchie Bridge."

A year has come and gone since we heard the news 'bout Billie Joe.
Brother married Becky Thompson, they bought a store in Tupelo.
There was a virus going 'round, Papa caught it and he died last Spring
And now, Mama doesn't seem to wanna do much of anything.
And me, I spend a lot of time pickin' flowers up on Choctaw Ridge
And drop them into the muddy water off the Tallahatchie Bridge.