I heard Odessa's mind was sick
That she was crazier than hell
The police caught her turning tricks

Down at the Blue and Gray motel
Odessa was the neighbor's maid
She had ten mouths at home to feed


They bussed her kids to Birmingham
And put her in the county jail

Nobody seemed to give a damn
They say a white man posted bail
My dad said not to breathe a word

I told my brother all I heard

And the train of change

Was coming fast to my hometown
We had the choice to climb on board
Or get run down


It was crazy there
Were grown men fights

Over segregation and civil rights
Martin Luther King and the KKK
George C. Wallace and LBJ

And when the National Guard came in
I thought the world was gonna end
It was crazy in Alabama


Down at the corner Dairy Dip
They sold soft ice cream for a dime

White people ordered from the front
The side was for the colored line
We all were told they had their place

Because they were a different race

We spent hot summer afternoons

At the public swimming pool
Where the privileged and the few
Played on their island of cool blue

Brown children
Watched outside the fence
It never made one lick of sense

But the train of change
Was coming fast to my hometown
We had the choice to climb on board

Or get run down

My momma yelled child get inside

Drew the drapes and locked the doors
We watched the marchers passing by
Felt the rumble heard the roar

They all held hands they sang and wept
And freedom rang in every step


Cause the train of change
Was marching through my hometown
We had the choice to climb on board

Or get run down