Lyrics:

Ode To Billie Joe
by Bobbie Gentry
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It was the third of June
Another sleepy, dusty Delta day
I was out chopping cotton
And my brother was baling 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 morning
From Choctaw Ridge
Today Billy Joe MacAllister
Jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge

And Papa said to Mama as he
Passed around the blackeyed peas
Well, Billy 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 Billy Joe, anyhow

Seems like nothing ever comes
To no good up on Choctaw Ridge
And now Billy 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 talking 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 cooking 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 Billy Joe was throwing
Something off the Tallahatchie Bridge

A year has come and gone
Since we heard the news 'bout Billy Joe
And 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
Picking flowers up on Choctaw Ridge
And drop them into the muddy water
Off the Tallahatchie Bridge.