You Don't Mess Around with Jim

The bowery got its bum

Uptown got its hustlers

42nd Street got Big Jim Walker

He's a pool-shootin' son of a gun

Yeah, he big and dumb as a man can come

But he stronger than a country horse

And when the bad folks all get together at night

You know they all call big Jim "Boss"

Just because

And they say

"You don't tug on Superman's cape

You don't spit into the wind

You don't pull the mask off that old Lone Ranger

And you don't mess around with Jim"

Well outta south Alabama come a country boy

He said, "I'm lookin' for a man named Jim

I am a pool-shootin' boy, my name's Willie McCoy

But down at home they call me Slim

Yeah I'm lookin' for the king of 42nd Street

He drivin' a drop top Cadillac

Last week he took all my money, and it may sound funny

But I come to get my money back"

And everybody say, "Jack don't you know

"You don't tug on Superman's cape

You don't spit into the wind

You don't pull the mask off that old Lone Ranger

And you don't mess around with Jim"

Well, a hush fell over the pool room

Jimmy come boppin' in off the street

And when the cuttin' was done

The only part that wasn't bloody

Was the soles of the big man's feet, ooh

And he was cut in about a hundred places

And he was shot in a couple more

And you better believe

They sung a different kind of story

When big Jim hit the floor now, they say

You don't tug on Superman's cape

You don't spit into the wind

You don't pull the mask off that old Lone Ranger

And you don't mess around with Slim

Yeah, big Jim got his hat

Find out where it's at

And it's not hustlin' people strange to you

Even if you do got a two-piece custom-made pool cue

Yeah you don't tug on Superman's cape

You don't spit into the wind

You don't pull the mask off that old Lone Ranger

And you don't mess around with Slim