Текст песни Ode To Billie Joe - The 5th Dimension

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 wipe your feet"
And then she said "I heard the news today from Choctaw Ridge"
"They tell me Billy Joe Macallister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge"
And Papa said to Mama as he passed around the blackeyed peas
"You know, that Billy Joe never had a lick of sense, now pass the biscuits please"
"I got five more acres in the lower forty I've got to plow"
Then Mama said "You know, it was a shame about Billy Joe, anyhow"
"Seems like nothin' ever comes to any good up on Choctaw Ridge"
"And now Billy Joe Macallister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge"

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

Mama said to me "Child, what's happened to your appetite?"
"Well I've been cookin' all morn' ain't touched a single bite"
"You know that nice young preacher, Brother Taylor, stopped by today"
"And he said I'd be pleased to have dinner on Sunday, oh by the way"
"I saw a girl that looked a lot like you up on Choctaw Ridge"
"And she and Billy Joe was throwing somethin' off the Tallahatchie Bridge"
"Have mercy"

Well a year has come 'n' gone since we heard the news 'bout Billy Joe
Brother married Becky Thompson, and 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, 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
And drop them into the muddy water off the Tallahatchie Bridge