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When the men take me to the devil tree
I will be free and shining like before
Papa dont tell me what I should've done
She's the one who begged me
"Take me home"
When the wind wraps me like the reaper's hand
I will swing free until they cut me down
Papa dont tell me what I could've done
She's the one who begged me
"Take me home"
When the sea takes me like my mother's arms
I will breathe free as any word of God
Papa dont tell me what you would've done
She's the one who begged me
"Take me home"
I will be free and shining like before
Papa dont tell me what I should've done
She's the one who begged me
"Take me home"
When the wind wraps me like the reaper's hand
I will swing free until they cut me down
Papa dont tell me what I could've done
She's the one who begged me
"Take me home"
When the sea takes me like my mother's arms
I will breathe free as any word of God
Papa dont tell me what you would've done
She's the one who begged me
"Take me home"
Lyrics submitted by feverdream
Track duration: 04:35
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In either case, Sam grew up in South Carolina, where even today there are areas that you should avoid at night if your black. I grew up in Georgia and went to school in SC, and I can tell you racism is still alive and well in many places in the South. Sam certainly witnessed enough of this sick behavior first-hand to provide motivation for a song.
I don't necessarily think that's the story of this song, but it certainly has echoes. The song may or may not have anything to do with racial issues.
Anyhow, as someone said above, the point of the song is obviously the emotion and meaning of the moment, whatever the events behind it.
I like how, when listening to it, the line 'take me home' could equally be him anticipating heaven. I think the driving rhythm of the music establishes the mood briliantly. It's almost as if he's so disgusted with the unjust world that he can't wait to get out of it - to go home.
Unless the man is lying, and he simply raped the girl and murdered her. But then the song is sort of weird and pointless, except perhaps as a story of egotism and blindness to one's own faults.
(Southern trees bear strange fruit,
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,
Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze,
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.
By Billie Holiday and Abel Meeropol 1937)
it could easily be any of the situations suggested above and we dont have to pick just one to beleive. it captures the moment without telling us the exact details of the moment...all the while sounding beautiful.
- Some sexual activity
- Accusation of rape
- They're going to hang him
- He tells his dad that he didn't do it, but assures his father that God knows the truth, and when he dies, in the eyes of God, he will be exonerated
Consider that if this were a lynching of a black man, he wouldn't say "when the men take me..." They would just take him on the spot. He seems to be talking from jail here.
Despite this, he has a very calm and cool "I know something you don't know" attitude. What he knows is that "the men" can kill him, but not take his "word of God" freedom.