[1st verse:] Down in Alabama where the cotton grows Lives a funny fellow by the name of Mose He hasn't anybody he can pick upon So he picks on a grand piano Morning, noon and night you'll find him picking rags I don't mean the kind of rags they put in bags He doesn't own a junk shop Just the same [Refrain:] He's a rag picker, a rag picker All the livelong day He bangs upon the piano keys In search of raggy melodies All day he's at the ivories And while he dozes, he composes Mister Moses makes an ordinary ditty sound so pretty Like nobody can Most any time of the day You'll find him picking away He's a rag picker, a rag picker A ragtime picking man [2nd verse:] Moses' father told me that upon the morn When his little piano playing boy was born They didn't have a cradle they could put him in So he slept on the grand piano In a week they found him there upon his knees Chewing on the highly polished piano keys That very day his father Loudly cried