The crops are all in and the peaches are rotting,
The oranges are stacked in their creosote dumps;
They're flying them back to the Mexican border
It takes all their money to wade back again
So farewell to my friends, goodbye, Rosalita,
Adios mis amigos, Jesus y Maria;
You won't have a name when you ride the big aeroplane,
All they will call you will be "deportees"
My father's own father, he waded that river,
They took all the money he made in his life;
My sisters and brothers they worked in the fruit fields,
And rode on the trucks till they lay down and died.
So farewell to my friends, goodbye, Rosalita,
Adios mis amigos, Jesus y Maria;
You won't have a name when you ride the big aeroplane,
All they will call you will be "deportees"
Some of us are illegal, and some are not wanted,
Our work contract's out and weve got to move on;
There's six hundred miles to that Mexican border,
They chase us like outlaws, like rustlers, like thieves.
So farewell to my friends, goodbye, Rosalita,
Adios mis amigos, Jesus y Maria;
You won't have a name when you ride the big aeroplane,
All they will call you will be "deportees"
We died in your hills, we died in your deserts,
We died in your mountains and died on your plains.
We died 'neath your trees and we died in your bushes,
Both sides of the river, we died just the same.
Farewell to my friends, goodbye, Rosalita,
Adios mis amigos, Jesus y Maria;
You won't have a name when you ride the big aeroplane,
All they will call you will be "deportees"
The sky plane caught fire over Los Gatos Canyon,
A fireball of lightning, it shook all our hills,
Who are these friends, who were scattered like dry leaves?
The radio said they were just deportees
Farewell to my friends, goodbye, Rosalita,
Adios mis amigos, Jesus y Maria;
You won't have a name when you ride the big aeroplane,
All they will call you will be "deportees"
Is this the best way we can grow our good orchards?
Is this the best way we can grow our good fruit?
To fall like the leaves and then rot on my topsoil
And never know no name except "deportees"?
Farewell to my friends, goodbye, Rosalita,
Adios mis amigos, Jesus y Maria;
You won't have a name when you ride the big aeroplane,
All they will call you will be "deportees"