The Delta Planters Social Club

The Delta Planters Supper Club

Up in the Mississippi Delta, where the hot nights swelter,
And cotton hangs like grapes on the vine,
Some Delta planters, those with genteel manners,
Wanted a dinner club with fine French wine.
Betty Lou the socialite, wife of planter John Wright,
Proposed they set down in writing a social pact.
But before the ink was dry and all had voted ‘aye,’
In her mind she was working up a class act.

It was her time soon and she already had a boon,
Cause she’d been to a fancy restaurant in Big D.
It was a big old juicy steak, served up on a fancy plate,
Covered up with mushrooms and dark brown gravy.
It was done to a turn, well but without any burn,
And it would literally melt in your mouth,
A steak of recognition, that would lift Betty’s position,
And would make her belle of the south.

So she gave John orders, change a young calf’s quarters,
And fatten him up for the Delta Supper Club.
Then she set about to gather, the other things that matter,
But no mushrooms became a real rub.
Her husband suggested if somehow they were tested,
There were mushroom in the field galore,
And though she'd rather not, she was in a tight spot,
So she cooked some and fed the dog, Theodore.

She checked him every hour, and though he was a little dour,
The mushroom’s toxins didn’t seem too strong.
So she pronounced them fine, marinated them with wine,
And laid them on the steaks with a song,
At about half past five, all the guests had arrived,
And seated around her antique marbled-top table.
They were served a drink that was mixed up in the sink
By a pretty buxom dark-skinned lass named Mable.

The dinner was superb, and Bette was not disturbed
Until just before the dessert was to be served.
Mable said Theodore had died, Betty Lou was mortified,
And prayed, Lord, this I do not deserve.
But her nerves couldn’t rest, for fear she’d poisoned her guests,
So she asked John Boy what do I do?
Tell them what you’ve done, and then call old Doc Gunn,
Or your friends are going to be mighty few.

These ‘rooms may kill ‘um or at best disable ‘um,
So you best call Doc to bring his tubes.
So in the kitchen were the men, the women in the den,
And Doc roared in cool as an ice cube.
Everyone was calm, when Doc came in with the balm,
And he set about to suction their stomachs dry,
Soon with everything done, Betty Lou paid old Doc Gunn
And then she sat down to have a cry.

Then in walked Mable, to say she’d cleared the table,
And now she was a fixing to go home.
As she started to the door, she stopped to talk some more,
But Betty Lou just wanted to be left alone.
I took a dip of snuff, cause the work was pretty rough,
And I was standing there a spittin' out the door,
It’s a dying shame, Miss Betty; it looked like that boy, Eddie,
And his car didn’t even stop when he ran over Theodore.