Gone are the days
when my heart was young and gay,
Gone are my friends from the cotton fields away,
Gone from the earth to a better land I know,
I hear their gentle voices calling, old black Joe.
Chorus: I'm coming, I'm coming,
for my head is bending low,
I hear their gentle voices calling, old black Joe.
Why do I weep, when my heart should feel no pain, Why do I sigh
when my friends come not again?
Grieving for forms now departed long ago. I hear their gentle voices calling, old black Joe.
Where are the hearts once so happy and so free? The children so dear that I held upon my knee.
Gone to the shore where my soul has longed to go, I hear their gentle voices calling,
old black Joe.
