Ode To Billy Joe chords by Bobby Gentry

Ode to Billy Joe

D7                                AM
It was the third of June, another sleepy,
             D7
dusty, Delta day

D7
I was out chopping cotton, and my

Am                  D7
brother was bailing hay,

       G7
And at dinner time we stopped and walked

back to the house to eat.

    D7
And Momma hollered out the back door

"Y'all re - member ...to wipe your feet!"

G7
And then she said, I got some news this

 mornin ...from Choctaw Ridge


       D7                     C7
Today  Billie Joe MacAllister jumped off

                  D7
 the Tallahatchie Bridge.

D7                            Am
And Poppa said to Momma as he passed

                     D7
around the blackeyed peas

  D7
 Well Billie Joe never had

           Am
 a lick of sense pass the biscuits

  D7
 please

 G7
"There's five more acres in the lower forty

...I got to plow.

D7
And Momma said it was shame ...a ?" bout

Billie Joe any - how,

G7
Seems like nothing ever comes to no good up

on Choctaw Ridge.

        D7                    C7
And now Billie Joe McAllister jumped off

                 D7
The Tallahatchie Bridge.

D7                                Am
And Brother said he recollected...when he

                    D7
and Tom, and Billie Joe


D7                             Am
Put a frog down my back at the Carroll

               D7
County Picture Show

G7
And, "Wasn't I talkin' to him


after church, last Sunday night.

D7
I'll have a-nother piece of apple pie


You know, it don't seem right.

  G7
I saw him at the sawmill yesterday up on

Choctaw Ridge.


            D7                   C7
And now you tell me Billie Joe's jumped off

                 D7
the Tallahatchie Bridge.

D7                                 Am
Momma said to me "Child? what's happened

               D7
To your appe - tite


Why, I've been cookin' all morning, and you

Am                       D7
haven't touched a single bite.

G7
That nice young preacher Brother Taylor

dropped by today.

D7
Said he'd be pleased to have dinner on

Sunday!  Oh, by the way.

G7
He said he saw a girl that looked a lot

like you up on Choctaw Ridge.

            D7
And she and Billie Joe was throwing

C7                              D7
Something  off the Tallahatchie Bridge.

D7                                Am
A year has come and gone since we heard the

                  D7
News bout Billie Joe


D7
Brother married Becky Thompson they

Am                     D7
Bought a store in Tupe-lo,


G7
There was a virus going round Poppa caught

                                    D7
it and he died last Spring. And now Momma

doesn't seem to wanna do much...of

any -thing

    G7
And me, I spend a lot of time pickin

flowers up on Choctaw Ridge.

              D7                   C7
And drop them into the muddy water off the

             D7
Tallahatchie Bridge.


END