[Verse 1:]
Honest where I start from
I try and impart my wisdom
A combination of truth and fear
That’s the way it’s always been
My father and his before him
At times we hurt the …
[Verse 1]
Oh, pity me
I’m so alone and so blue
My friends have all gone away
Their friendliness too
[Pre-Chorus]
It was I on my own
With no need to belong
And I wanted to die
That’s when …
[Verse 1]
Got some money, got some cash
I’m rich and now I’m sad
And I wonder if I’m sad about the money that I have
Got some boats on my plane
At the hotel …
[Intro]
Yeah
Polishin’ a goddamn sword, you know what I’m sayin’?
Polishin’ a sword (Uh, uh, uh, uh)
Concrete Family, Concrete Industries, Concrete Boys up, always, never down
(And this beat from Cash, not from …
When the only sound in the empty street
Is the heavy tread of the heavy feet
That belong to a lonesome cop
I open shop
When the moon so long has been gazing down
On …
Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where they strung up a man
They say murdered three.1
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it seem
If we met at midnight
In the hanging tree.2
Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where the dead man called out
For his love to flee.3
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it seem
If we met at midnight
In the hanging tree.
Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where I told you to run,
So we’d both be free.4
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it seem
If we met at midnight
In the hanging tree.
Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Wear a necklace of rope,5
Side by side6 with me.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it seem
If we met at midnight
In the hanging tree.
Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where I told you to run,
So we’d both be free.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it seem
If we met at midnight
In the hanging tree
Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where they strung up a man
They say murdered three.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it seem
If we met at midnight
In the hanging tree.
Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where the dead man called out
For his love to flee.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it seem
If we met at midnight
In the hanging tree.7
This haunting tune of “The Hanging Tree” originally written by Suzanne Collins for her Hunger Games book series invokes imagery comparable to lynching trees, such as those white supremacists commonly used to hang African-Americans in the United States.
If someone is unfortunate enough to meet someone else in the hanging tree, both of them are probably dead already.
A man being hung might make a desperate cry to his lover to run away, lest she also be hanged.
Each verse of this song has a minor lyrical change. In this verse, there is a sense of all-or-nothing desperation, a need to escape the hanging tree’s fatal wrath. This part can also be interpreted as “death sets us free”. In other words, are you coming to the hanging tree, where you will be hung and set free. You can see the play on words here – one’s knowledge that he or she will be hung, and yet this will set them free.
“Necklace of rope” refers to a noose.
“Side by side” typically invokes a positive image of companionship, but in this case, the phase conjures imagery of two bodies swinging lifelessly next to one another.
The song ends with an eerie chorus of voices and horn instruments that cause listeners to fear the idea of the hanging tree.
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