Man, this jes about how I feel mahsef some days. Woman done lef me, repo man done snatched my ride, viction notice nailed up on mah do. Doan nobody love me. Doan nobody know mah scrutiatin pain. 'Cept'n Halley jes called me up from California, so now I's feelin a little better. She hadn't'a called, doan know whadall I woulda done. Felt jes like I was fixin ta die. And now Massah George gwine come round kick my ass good fo talkin like a nigrah. Ain no peace fo the white man no mo. I mean, whad I do ta get down in a jackpot like this here? I'm tellin ya it's a mutha fucka. Man like the Woof, tho, he might jes unnerstan. If he wadn't dead that is...

Ahem... Yes, I see. And how long have you been feeling this way?

Shit, boss, I dunno. I guess since I was a little bitty baby, an my momma useta rock me in the cradle, in them ol' cotton fields back home...

I thought you were born in Boston while your father was finishing his Ph.D. at Harvard.

Oh dude, you such a fuckin drag, you know? Why you wanna go talkin shit like that bout me? I was brung up in Arkansas six miles from the Texas border, an that's God's own truth, Doc. Me an little Billy Joe-Bob useta shoot rattlesnakes jest to see em die. I was mean as they come right outta the shute. Born for good luck. And money too. Got seven hunnert dollars baby gonna mess with you cause I am...

Yes, yes, I'm sure you am. But let's get back to the fact that you are in fact a middle aged white male who has not worked in three years, and are now begging from your friends and have no car.

Oh fuck you Doc. Jes fuck off! Lea' me be.

Yes, so, well, anyway, The New York Times has this to say about that:

In this book's quoted descriptions, Howlin' Wolf (1910-76) stood anywhere from 6 foot 3 to 6 foot 8 and glowed darkly, like motor oil. The singer Ronnie Hawkins heard Wolf's serrated, gravelly voice as "stronger than 40 acres of crushed garlic." The poet Philip Larkin likened it to "Coleridge's demon love." Wolf left scattered impressions of sweetheart and abuser, wise owl and dummy: "two steps ahead of an idiot," said the recording engineer Malcolm Chisholm; "close to being a genius," said the saxophonist Fat Sonny Williams.

He could hold up the back end of a car to change a flat tire. He wore Size 14 shoes, or, according to the notes of an Army doctor, 16. (The same doctor noted his "tendency to destroy furniture," and diagnosed him with "psychoneurosis.")

YEAH! Tha's what I got too, Doc. Got that sy-ko-nu-ro-sis but good this time! Look, I'm bustin up yo chair! Yo desk! Yo hole muthafuckin office! What I need's a woman goddamit. Doc, go get me a good lookin girl fo I bus up yo face. Ya hear?

Oh well, all right Mr. Wolf, if that's what you really think you need...

...but then you have to promise to leave and never come back.

You get me a fine enough piece, Doc, I ain't gwine-a wanna come back. Here a fi dolla bill. You go out an fetch me some a that sweet stuff. Yeah. And pick up a fith a decent whiskey with the change. Go on now, fo I ten' to 'stroy yo furniture wid my size 18 shoes!

could be a spoonful of water
save you from the desert sand
little spoon of lead from my .45
save you from another man

that spoon, that spoon
that spoonful...