a film about robert johnson

birth of the blues

They says they was a man
But they ain’t sho’
Don’t nobody know what was this mans home
He don’t got a mama o’ a pappy
Aun brutha o’ sista
Alls he got’s his gitar and a his saaaad sad song
His balls and his word
But dontcha go on aksin him
Cuz he wont tell

Lawd jesus could he play
Eva note the tears o’ the devil
Let me tell it the devil his self
They say he wont born
He like not to eva’ exist
Nary a picture of him ‘round

They say he was come to the cross roads
Full grown, a go’geus black man
Lands a’mighty he shone like wood fire
Beside this man was a gitar carved from
Black oak with strangs a’gold
He git up and looked
Left, was desert, right was a forest
Trees fulla that there
Strange fruit

And ahead was blacker than the heart
That made him
So black ya couldn’t see ya eyes close
And it was sweet as revenge

They say they was a road yonder
Plain as day it shone through that darkness
And it was anotha’n run ‘cross it
He aint know why or what, but he know
He gotta cross that road

And there he go, holdin’ fast to
His flesh bound book

Skin was white as snow in the moonlight
Eyes burned like whip ‘cross yo back
With the finest zoot suit yo’ eyes did see
He was beautiful
And this man called to that butha
And told him he would change the world
If he would give up his soul

If’n he he was a man ‘fore this
He might’na knowed what’d happen
But he wasn’t
He was newborn, green, a lil’ sapplin
And this here beautiful man was a full tit
Offerin’ him the great I am
The world for a soul and a suck

This man they say look at his gitar
Then he look at the snow white stranga’
He say he’d give anythin’ a make that
black and gold moan
And he prick his own fanga
And sign his name in that stranga’s book

Not even ‘fore the blood dry
This here wood fired man o’ ash and coal
Strum them strangs
And sounds man aint neva know poured out
The tears o’ the devil
They say that strange fruit jump down
from the tree, and move like
Like this man plucked Gawd’s breath outta that
Gitar

man look around for the stranga
But he was gone
Nuthin but the smell o’ sulfur and burnin’ flesh
Left behind
And a note that say
“See ya’ in 27 years my boy”

So he was born
Black man sho’ nuff like no other
And ever act to come there afta’
Would know the name
O’ Robert Johnson