Stop Me If You’ve Heard This One

Okay, so

Tom Waits, Rober­to Beg­ni­ni
and John Lurie are in a
jail in Lou­siana and they’ve
got one cig­a­rette left. The
con­crete walls sweat with
humid­i­ty and the mat­tress­es
stink like stale sweat and dry
urine. These guys have one
cig­a­rette and a pack of cards.
Beg­ni­ni don’t play gin
and Lurie won’t play spades.
Waits would play with him­self
but the oth­ers might see. So
no one uses the cards and
instead they all wor­ry about
that last smoke. Lurie’s
got the cof­fin-nail in his pock­et
he knows he’ll have to share it
if he lights it up. Maybe if he
waits until the oth­ers are asleep.

Waits sticks to his bunk like an old gym sock
and Lurie paces. Beg­ni­ni won’t shut up.
They’re all think­ing about the last
cig­a­rette. Well, Waits is think­ing about
wait­ing until Lurie falls asleep and steal­ing it.
His name is patient. Beg­ni­ni is think­ing about
baked ziti and what it felt like to crush
a man’s skull with a pool ball.

They are a good egg, down by law.


I watched Jim Jar­musch’s Down By Law a while back.