MISSISSIPPI SUMMER - written and copyrighted by Si Khan, transcribed from the recording by June Tabor with the Oyster Band.

My hands are as cracked as an August field,
Burned in the sun for a hundred years,
Furrows so deep you could hide yourself,
Ain't plantin' cotton no more this year,
I'll just sit on the porch with my eagle eye,
Watch for a change in the breeze,
Roads are as stright as a shotgun barrel,
Long as a bullet can see.

Chorus
You know hot it gets in Mississippi,
You know how dry it gets in the summer sun,
The dust clouds swirl all down the Delta,
I just hope that I don't die before the harvest comes

Black clouds gathering at the edge of town,
But no rain's gonna fall on us,
Bones? rise and fall in a distant field,
Earth takes a beating for all of us,
I thought I heard the engine of death up ahead?
It was only the crop duster spray?
Bones? rise and fall like the beating of wings,
Lord send us fleeting/ creeping? away?

Chorus.