San Francisco Mabel Joy

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My daddy was an honest man just a redneck Georgia farm boy
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My momma spent her short life raisin' kids and bailin' hay
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And I was just fifteen when I ached inside to wander
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So I hopped a freight in Waycross and I rode it to L. A.

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Well I met a girl known on the strip as San Francisco?s Maybel Joy
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Destitution?s child born on a L.A. street called shame
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And sleep came and left this little Waycross Georgia country boy
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Maybel Joy was gone Lord I?d never see her again

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Growin? up came quietly in the arms of Maybel Joy
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Laughter found our morning's brought new meaning to my life
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I woke up one day Lord to find that I was by myself
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With dreams of Georgia cotton and California wine

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Sunday mornin' found me standin' 'neath the red light at her door
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Right cross sent me reelin' laid me face down on the floor
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In place of my Maybel Joy I found a merchant mad marine
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Who said "Your Georgia neck is red but sonny you're still green"

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Well I turned twenty-one in a grey rock federal prison
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The judge he had no mercy on this Waycross Georgia boy
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Sometimes at night in silence Lord I'd listen
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That same old freight to take me back to Maybel Joy

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Cold nights had no pity on this Waycross Georgia farm boy
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Springtime turned to summer and then the winter came
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Starin' at those four grey walls in silence Lord I'd listen
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Somewheres in the distance to the whistle of the train

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Sunday mornin' found me lyin' 'neath the red-light at her door
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With a bullet in my side I cried "Have you seen Maybel Joy?"
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Stunned and shaken someone said "Son she don't live here no more
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She left this town ten years ago I heard she's lookin? for
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Some Georgia farm boy"