Beauty at the Backdoor Songtext

von Billy Bob Thornton

There's a screened-in porch in the front but not in the back. The back's just got
A door and a crepe myrtle bush and a little ole dried up garden and some woods
Way on back. There's a hickory nut tree that covers the whole roof. Sounds like
Hand grenades hittin' the tin roof all the time. There's an old wood floor that's
Bowed up just about everywhere. lt's got a thin coat of white stuff on it even
Though it's a dark wood floor. There's a washing machine right outside the back
Door. It's a ringer washer, the kind they don't make anymore. I got my hand
Caught it in several times and usually got my ass whipped for it. Even though I's
The one that got hurt. There 's a snake stick, that's what they called it anyway, by
The back door because if you wanted to go outside you'd usually need it.
Everything's green most of the time except in the winter, when you could see the
Highway. It's not a leaf of the trees. There's an old rock well where we clean the
Squirrels. I used to sit out there by that and watch the Carbur girl
Come down the road.

She didn't have but one dress and that's all she needed. It was kinda red and
Kinda gray and kinda tore up and kinda perfect. She's built like a brick shit-
House. She had polish on her toenails that only went about halfway down
'cause they was always tore up. She used to walk across the side yard right by
The well and go stand by the crepe myrtle bush and look in the screen door.
She'd usually stand there for about ten minutes and back then I wasn't sure
What she wanted. These days I understand. If I'd a known then what I know
Now well, my life might have been pretty different. Well, she was about eight or
Nine years older than I was when I first started school. I knew there was some-
Thin'. There's somethin' about the South and the air is a lot heavier and it seems
Like the women sweat even when they're not.

I don't know if you've ever heard rain on a tin roof or not but it's kinda tailor
Made for love and one day I was in the house and I was lookin' back toward the
Back screen door and thre she was. Standin' there for ten minutes. The only
Thing different this day is that my daddy went back there and talked to her and
Told her she looked pretty. I thought the same thing but there was somethin'
'bout the look in his eye was a little different than the one I had in mine and he
Walked outside and they went past the crepe myrtle bush and past the well and
Out into the green and I walked to the back door and I watched for a long time
And all I could see was trees and after a time, I really couldn't see. They came
Back out and my daddy was walkin' way ahead of her and she was kinda follow-
Ing, almost runnin'. He acted like he didn't want to have anything to do with her
And I was wondering why. Why would you be so happy going in and so down
Coming out. I don't know. That's what I thought then. He didn't act like she's
So pretty anymore. Now I think I get it. I think I've got it several times.