The Church of the Blood

H. Rap Brown said, "Violence is as American as apple pie," and was immediately pilloried for speaking the truth.

You can't spend much time thinking about American history without wandering into a cemetery of sex, violence, religion, and money. Sometimes all under the same stone.

Murder ballads hit our shores in the mid-1700's. They almost always have to do with abduction, rape, murder, and retribution, but they also cover incest, suicide, infanticide, etc. Gangsta' rap has very little on these old, Scots-Irish ballads. A huge trove of them got lodged in the backwoods of Appalachia and were copied and catalogued by musicologist Francis Child.

I've wanted to try my hand at a murder ballad for some time. This started coming as I was driving up I-5. Soon as I got off I started scribbling it down at stoplights. Anyone wants to write the music, just let me know.

Song w/o Music 1


THE CHURCH OF THE BLOOD

Preacher comes 'round the back door
Just to see what he can find
Thinks he might spot some sinner
Hanging wash up on the line

CHORUS:
He's from the church of what you got
The church of what he can get
He's from the church of the blood of the dollar bill
And you're the prettiest thing he ever has met

She's there just like he wanted
Cotton dress all clingy and fine
She turns around, and when she smiles
He says, "Little lamb, you're mine."

Puts his big hand on her shoulder
Looks her straight  in the eye
Says follow me I know the way
To a love that'll never die

CHORUS:
He's from the church of what you got
The church of what he can get
He's from the church of the blood of the dollar bill
And you're the prettiest thing he ever has met

He lays her down in the tall grass
By the tree up on the hill
Treats her rough and beats her up
And then he takes his fill

She struggles and it's a sad story
She dies in his hands that day
A cold wind comes down turns his head around
And he knows that he's gonna' pay


CHORUS:
He's from the church of what you got
The church of what he can get
He's from the church of the blood of the dollar bill
And you're the prettiest thing he ever has met

The hunters found her body
They buried her where she lay
Was her grandpap's land and her tombstone stands
Right there to this very day

And the god damned preacher he hanged himself
From a branch on that same oak tree
They cut him down, put him in the ground
In a place far away from the scene

People say you can see his shadow
Fallin' 'cross the white of her stone
Others say it's a trick of the moonlight
But you better not go to that grave alone.

CHORUS:
He's from the church of what you got
The church of what he can get
He's from the church of the blood of the dollar bill
And you're the prettiest thing he ever has met.


RW
10/17

photo by ed snyder: the cemetery traveler