Strange Fruit
Billy Holiday
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.
Pastoral scene of the gallant
south,
The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth,
Scent of
magnolias, sweet and fresh,
Then the sudden smell of burning
flesh.
Here is fruit for the crows to
pluck,
For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck,
For the
sun to rot, for the leaves to drop,
Here is a strange and bitter
crop.
