San Francisco Mabel Joy

D D G D His Daddy was an honest man, just a red dirt Georgia farmer D A His mother spent her short life havin' kids and balin' hay D G D He had fifteen years and he ached inside to wander D A D So he jumped a freight in Waycross and wound up in L.A D G D The cold nights had no pity on a Waycross, Georgia farm boy D A Most days he went hungry, then the summer came D G D He met a girl known on the strip as San Francisco's Mabel Joy D A D Destitution's child born of an L.A street called "Shame" G D Growin' up came quietly in the arms of Mabel Joy D A Laughter found their mornings brought a meaning to his life G D Yes, the night before she left sleep came and gave that Waycross country boy D A D A dream of Georgia cotton and a California wife G D Sunday morning found him standin' neath the red light at her door D A When a right cross sent him reelin', put him face down on the floor G D In place of Mabel Joy he found a merchant mad marine D A N.C. Who growled, "Your Georgia neck is red, oh but sonny, you're still green" D D G D He turned twenty-one in a gray rock fed'ral prison D A The old judge had no mercy for a Waycross country boy D G D Starin' at those four gray walls in silence, lord, he'd just listen D A To the midnight freight he knew could take him back to Mabel Joy G D Sunday mornin' found him lyin' 'neath the red light at her door D A With a bullet in his side, he cried, "Have you seen Mabel Joy?"? G D Stunned and shaken someone said, "Why, she don't live here no more D She left this house four years today, A N.C. D they say she's lookin' for some Georgia farm boy"