The Great Smoke Off
Composer(s): Shel Silverstein
Performer(s): Shel Silverstein



Now in the laid back California town of sunny San Rafael
Lived a girl named Pearly Sweetcake
you probably knew her well
She was stoned fifteen
of her eighteen years
And her story was widely told
That she could smoke em faster
than anyone could roll

Well her legend finally reached New York
that grove street walk up flat
Where dwelt the Calistoga Kid
a beatnik from the past
He'd been rolling dope since time began
Now took a cultured poke 
and said Jim I can roll em faster
than any chick can smoke

So a note gets sent to San Rafael
for the championship of the world
The kid demands a smoke off
Well bring him on says Pearl
I'll grind his fingers of his hands
He'll roll until he drops
Says Calistoga I'll smoke that chick
till blows up and pops

So they rent out Yankee Stadium
and the word is quickly spread
Come one come all who walk or crawl
Tickets just two lids a head
And from every town and hamlet
Over land and sea they speed
The worlds greatest dopers
with the worlds greatest weed

Hasishes from Marocco, hemp smokers from Peru
And the Schasnicks from Bagon
Who smoke the deadly pugaru
And those who call it light of life
And those that call it boo

See the dealers and their ladies
Wearing turquoise lace and leather
See the narcos and the closet smokers
puffin all together
From the teenies who smoke legal
to the ones who've done some time
To the old man who smoked reefer
back before it was a crime

And the grand old house that Ruff built
is filled with the smokes and cries
of fifty screaming heads
all stoned out of their minds
And they play the national anthem
and the crowd lets out a roar
as the spotlight hits the Kid and pearl
ready for their smoking war

At a table piled high with grass
as high as a mountain peak
just top and buds of the rarest flowers
not one stem branch or seed
I mean a mowie a wowie a Panama red
Acapulco gold, keef from east Afghanistan
and that rare Alaska cold
and there's sticks from Thiland,games from the island
and Bangkok's blooming best and some of that wet imported shit
that capsized of Key west
There's wahokin pops and Kenya burn, and Reverie flors
and that rare Manhattan silver 
that grows down the New York sewers

And there's bubbling ice cold lemonade
and sweet grapes by the bunches
and there's Hershey bars and Orios
in case anybody gets the munches
And the calastoga kid he smiles
and Pearly she just grins
And the drums roll low, and the crowd yells go go go
and the worlds first smoke off begins

Well the kid he flicks his fingers once
sot that first joint's rolled
Pearl takes one poke with her famous lungs
and whoosh that roach is cold
Then the kid he rolls his super bomb
that would paralyze a moose
and Pearl takes one mighty hip, that bombs defused
And then he rolls three in just ten seconds
and she smokes them up in nine
And everybody sits back and says hey
this just might take some time

See the blur of fling fingers
see the red coal burning bright
As the night turns into morning
and the morning fades to night
And the autumn turns to summer
and a whole damn year is gone
and the two still sit on that roach filled stage
smoking and Rollin'
with trembling hands he rolls his jays
with fingers blue and stiff
she coughs, and stares with blood shot gaze
and puffs through blistered lips

And as she reaches out her hand
for another stick of gold
The Kid he gasps, "Goddamn it, bitch
there's nothing' left to roll"
"Nothin' left to roll?" screams Pearl
"Is this some twisted joke?"
"I didn't come here to fuck around, man
"I come here to Smoke!"
And she reaches 'cross the table
and she grabs his bony sleeves
And she crumbles his body between her hands
like dried and brittle leaves
Flicking' out his teeth and bones
like useless stems and seeds
Then she rolls him in a Zig Zag
and lights him like a roach
And the fastest man with the fastest hands
goes up in a puff of smoke

In the laid-back California town of sunny San Rafael
Lives a girl named Pearley Sweetcake
you probably know her well
She's been stoned twenty-one
of her twenty-four years
and the story's widely told
How she still can smoke them faster
than anyone can roll
While off in New York City
on a street that has no name
There's the hands of The Calistoga Kid
in the Viper Hall of Fame
And underneath his fingers
there's a little golden scroll
That says
"Beware of Bein' the Roller
When There's Nothin' Left to Roll"