I got a gal in Cedartown Georgia
Used to have to walk nearly three miles to court her
She never had much; just a sharecropper's daughter
But I married her and took her down to New Orleans, got a little house in the South French Quarter


Got a job hookin' bait an’ loadin ‘um on the steamboat
I gave her seven days pay, next day I’m broke
When she ain't a’sleepin' all day, she's a primpin'
Every evenin' when the sun goes down, she starts a’swarmin' on Orlean town


Walkin' to work this mornin' at daybreak
Caught her with a tall dark dandy from Canebreak
She walked right by me and she looked right through me
I made up my mind what I'm a gonna do: eased in the pawnshop and bought a 22


I watched as the room clerk gave them a room key
Standin' outside I could read Room 23
Tonight I'll put her on a train for Georgia
Gonna be a lotta kinfolk squallin' and a’grieving, ‘cause that Cedartown gal ain't breathing