This is the ballad of Elizabeth Cooke
who killed Bobby Phillips yet was let off the hook,
& maybe it's true that that's just a lie,
but I think Liz at least caused the old man to die.

Well, now, Bobby Phillips had just gotten out of prison, see,
& he was havin' a devil of a time findin' a job,
on account of his havin' been in prison,
so he started hangin' with an assortment of hippie folk
who would sell whatever they could dredge out of various dumpsters
& one of them was a little lady named Elizabeth Cooke.
Now, Bobby didn't have a woman, & he was about 65
& Liz was half that, give or take,
and when you want to impress a woman
& the odds are staked so heavily against you,
well, you put all your cards on the table,
even the ones that are a bit, shall we say, less than credible,
so Bobby tells Liz 1.7 million dollars is supposedly
gonna come to him from some phony lawsuit,
even though that money had about the same chance of happenin'
as rain does in Death Valley.

This is the ballad of Elizabeth Cooke
who killed Bobby Phillips yet was let off the hook,
& maybe it's true that that's just a lie,
but I think Liz at least caused the old man to die.

Now, I don't know the details, but somehow Liz convinced
poor old Bobby Phillips to make out his will entirely to her.
Not only that, but he also gives her full power of attorney.
So when the paramedics arrive to try 'n' revive Bobby
(as he had collapsed on the floor), Liz pulls out this paper
sayin' Bobby doesn't want to be resuscitated.
And it's all signed & legal, so they don't resuscitate him.
And that's how he died.
Fast-forward a few months: Liz is tryin' to steal a man's car.
He gets madder than a Spanish bull & starts yellin' like the sky's
about to fall, so she wanders off. But she happens to leave
her phone, which happens to still be logged in,
so he starts postin' as her. Then the man receives a text claimin'
Liz gave Bobby a poisoned dose of hard drugs in order to kill him.
And the sender of that text is also now dead, overdosed on
Covid plus methamphetamine.

This is the ballad of Elizabeth Cooke
who killed Bobby Phillips yet was let off the hook,
& maybe it's true that that's just a lie,
but I think Liz at least caused the old man to die.

Now, Elizabeth is a hippie--
she dances at all them flower festivals
way out in the country
where nothin's in control,
so next time you hear some hippie-type
beggin' "Oh, won't you tip me, please?"
or maybe praisin' the Grateful Dead
while tryin' to smoke all your weed,
remember Bobby Phillips,
remember that he's dead,
remember that he could've been
alive today instead,
'cause there are a lot of easy friends round here
who'll smile & pat your back
'cause they think you'll give 'em thangs
if that's the way they act.

[saxophone solo]