“Dere’s an ol’ man called de Mississippi …
“Dat ol’ man river … He jes keeps rollin’ along …
“He don’t plant taters, He don’t plant cotton. An’ dem dat plants ’em is soon forgotten.
“But ol’ man river, He jes keeps rollin’ along.”
Indeed he does. The Mississippi has crested and rolled past Memphis, but farther downstream, people in the Delta were preparing with sandbags as the rising water approached record levels.