Strange Fruit

billie holiday photo by celogarta.

I was watching the Bob Dylan documentary “No Direction Home” and saw a clip from Billie Holiday singing Strange Fruit. I had never heard this before. Reading the lyrics is powerful enough, but with Billie Holiday singing them, seeing her . . . it was one of those moments of terrible lucidity.

Strange Fruit

Southern trees bear 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 scene of the gallant south,
The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth,
Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh,
Then the sudden smell of burning flesh.

Here is 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 cry.