Refresh. Something else just occurred to me about why the song is so puzzling in its meaning- I think Louise Bennett collected all the songs on her album. Although she is mostly known as a poet, another well-known thing about her is that she was a folklorist. From Google Books I discovered that she wrote a book published in 1950 called "Anancy Stories and Dialect Verse". That book contains Jamaican folk songs and this song might be in there. It's possible that since she helped in the repertoire for the Edric Connor LP of Jamaican folk songs, she was responsible for this song being on the track list. Lord Burgess adapts the song from the version he hears on the LP and Harry Belafonte (who might have remembered the song from his period living in Jamaica as a child) decides he likes it and wants to record it.