Cissie’s Song

I took a train to Sault-Saint Marie.
There was a Mississipi virgin waiting for me.
I had a treasure map, an attitude, a longing, a plea.
I said: Can someone help find the old faith in Me?
You won’t believe it, it’s unfortunate, see
 I adhere to the ghosts of Robert E and Stagger Lee.
And she said, I come from Indianola and my name be Cissie Dupree.

Oh Cissie, Oh Cissie, Oh Cissie Dupree.
I go down there. You know where. And I swear you taste like sassafras tea.

We looked hard to find the Queen Victoria Hotel,
where old ladies in corsets and crinoline dwell.
It's a familiar hell, one where satisfaction dwells.
I was all loosy goose, while Cissie cleaned up all my juice.
Now I see there’s nothing in Upper Michigan but tomfoolery,
flannel-shirted hostility. Ol' tore up pictures of  the Pope and J.F.K.
And a treatise in the paper on the way we die today.

Yea, Cissie, Oh Cissie. Oh Cissie Dupree.
I go down there. You know where. And I swear you taste like sassafras tea.

I said, Cissie, Oh Cissie, I think you lied to me!
You played fast and loose about your virginity.
I just wanted to feel like one of them apostles feels,
when the leaven of mercy gets stranded.
This bottle of whiskey, it cannot save me.
You see my heart is so full with an ache for purity,
but it's  just God’s always joking, and now he’s laughing at me.

Oh Cissie, Oh Cissie, Oh Cissie Dupree.
I don’t care about your hymen. Just get back in bed with me

— Ivor Irwin