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Southern trees bear strange fruit

Blood on the leaves and blood at the root

Black bodies swinging in southern breeze

Strange fruit hanging from the trees

Life is cheap in the south

The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth

Differences of man that didn’t mesh

Then the sudden smell of burning flesh

Here is a fruit for the crows to pluck

For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck

For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop

Here is a strange and bitter crop

Tighten the noose for the rest to see

I’ll cut you down on bent knee