Lyrics Billie Holiday - Strange Fruit

Southern trees bear
A strange, 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 scenes of the gallant South,
The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth,
Scent of magnolia sweet and fresh,
Then the sudden smell of burning flesh.

Here's fruit for the crows to pluck,
For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck,
For the sun to rot, for the tree to drop,
Here is a strange and bitter crop.