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Potter\'s Field
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Tom Waits
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well you can buy me a drink and i'll tell you what i seen
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and i'll give you a bargain from the edge of a maniac's dream
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that buys a black widow spider with a riddle in his yarn
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that's clinging to the furrow of a blindman's brow
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i'll start talking from the brim of a thimble full of whiskey
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on a train through the bronx that will take you just as far
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as the empty of a bottle to the highway of a scar
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that stretched across the blacktop of my cheek like that
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and then ducks beneath the brim of a fugitive's hat
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and you'll learn why liquor makes a stool pigeon rat on every face
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that ever left his shadow down on saint marks place
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hell i'd double cross my mother if it was whiskey that they payed
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and so an early bird says nightsticks on the hit parade
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and he ain't got a prayer and his days are numbered
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and you'll track him down like a dog
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well it's a tough customer you're getting in this trade
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cause the nightstick's heart pumps lemonade
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well whiskey keeps a blindman talkin alright
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and i'm the only one who knows just where he stayed last night
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he was in a wreckin yard in a switchblade storm
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in a wheelbarrow with nothing but revenge to keep him warm
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and a half a million dollars in unmarked bills
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was the nightstick's blanket in a febuary chill
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and as the buzzard drove a crooked sky
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he was dealin high chicago in the mud
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and stackin' the deck against a dragnet's eye
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a shivering nightstick in a miserable heap
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with the siren for a lullaby singing him to sleep
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he was bleeding from a buttonhole
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torn by a slug fired from the barrel of a two dollar gun
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that scorched a blister on the grip of a punk by now
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is learnin what you have to pay to be a hero anyhow
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he dressed the hole in his gut with a hundred dollar bandage
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a king's ransom for a bedspread that don't amount to nuttin
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just cobweb strings on a busted ukulele
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and the nightstick leaned on a black shillelagh
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with the poison of a junkie's broken promise on his lip
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he staggered in the shadows screaming i ain't never been afraid
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and he shot out every street light on the promenade
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past the frozen ham and eggers at the penny arcade
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throwin out handfuls of a blood stained salary
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they were dead in their tracks at the shootin gallery
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and they fired off a twenty one gun salute
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and from the corner of his eye he caught the alabaster orbs
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and from a dime a dance hall girl and stuffed a thousand dollar bill
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in her blouse and caught the cruel and unusual punishment of her smile
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and the nightstick winked beneath a rainsoaked brim
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ain't no one seen hide nor hair of him see
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no one but a spade on rikers island and me
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and so if you're mad enough to listen to a full of whiskey blindman
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then you're mad enough to look beyond where bloodhounds dare to go
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so if you want to know just where the nightstick's hidin out
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you be down at the ferry landin oh let's say bout half past a nightmare
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when it's twisted on a clock you tell 'em nickels sentcha
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whiskey always makes him talk
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and you ask for captain charon with the mud on his kicks
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he's the skipper of the deadline steamer
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and she sails from the bronx across the river styx
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and a riddle's just a ticket for a dreamer
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cause when the weathervane's sleepin and the moon turns his back
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you crawl on your belly long the railroad tracks
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and cross your heart and hope to die and stick a needle in your eye
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cause he'd cut my bleedin heart out if he found out that i squealed
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cause you see a scarecrow's just a hoodlum
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who marked the cards that he dealed
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and pulled a gypsy switch
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out on the edge of potter's field
Tom Waits - "Downtown Train"
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