Sousa Band Follow

KING COTTON

Pick the cotton and pick the cotton and pick the cotton some more!

You’re pickin’ cotton until you drop
You’re never gettin’ away
You’d rather be in a coffee shop
With fish and chips on your tray.

You’re bendin’ down
Your back is broke
Your fingers ache and
Your feet are smokin’

Your head is numb
Your legs are gone
And you’ve got nothing to say

You’re pickin’ cotton the whole day through
Until the evening is done.
You’ll never get a vacation or a getaway for some fun.

You grind your knees into the dirt,
You rip your pants and you tear your shirt,
But you can’t complain, your back’s in pain,
And you get nothin’ for pay

‘Cause that sonavabitch will never let you
Take a break at all,
You’ll never get any food
Or water, juice or alcohol

So pick your cotton, boy. This rotten
Day has just begun, and you will
Not be done with pickin’ till it’s
Later in the Fall

I’m tellin’ you what my life is like
So listen up my friend
My mother is holding up all right
Although her back don’t bend

We pick all day, we pick all night
And when the day is over we can
Grab a little nap and then we do it all again.

TRIO

You’ll never guess how much I really love this job,
So, I’m giving you fair warning
I love the foreman who can make my mother sob
While pickin’ cotton in the morning.

You see that bastard with the whip? His name is “Bob”.
Woke me up at five this morning,
You’ll never know how much I need to stab that slob
And spread his guts to rot ‘til dawning

DOGFIGHT

You’ve got to
Bend down, open a boll
Pick out the lint, bag it!

If your bag’s getting’ full
Harder to pull, drag it!

Fill the bag my friend
Fill it once again
Fill it till your fingers bleed, boy!

TRIO (REPRISE)

We’re living in the carefree days of slavery;
We should thank our white-skinned neighbors
For saving us from jungle heat and misery,
And turning us to useful labor

(Repeat Dogfight)

You’ll never know how much I love plantation life,
Full of sweet perfume and romance;
You’ll never know how much I’d like to use Bob’s knife
To separate him from his gonads.

Copyright 2008 by Don Farrar
All rights reserved