- Francis Phelan: I'd like to buy this shirt from you. Will you take two bits for it?
- Rosskam: Why does a bum need a clean shirt?
- Francis Phelan: Clothes make the man, they say.
- Rosskam: Tidy bum. Sensitive, tidy bum I got on my wagon.
- Helen: [talking to herself in the mirror] What if I did drink too much wine? Whose business is that anyway? Who knows how much I *didn't* drink, huh?
- Francis Phelan: [in her imagination after singing in the tavern] By God, Helen, that's as good as it gets. You were born to be a star.
- Rudy: You know somebody that's buried up there?
- Francis Phelan: Yeah, a little kid.
- Rudy: Little kid? What'd he do, die young?
- Francis Phelan: Pretty young, yeah.
- Rudy: What happened?
- Francis Phelan: He fell.
- Rudy: Fell where?
- Francis Phelan: On the floor.
- Rudy: Fell on the floor? I fall on the floor about twice a day. I ain't dead yet.
- Francis Phelan: That's what you think.
- Francis Phelan: [after Sandra's death] What was her last name?
- Pee Wee: Never heard it.
- Francis Phelan: Don't matter now, huh?
- Pee Wee: Never did.
- Reverend Chester: I believe that I've got a job for you.
- Francis Phelan: I worked today up at the cemetery.
- Reverend Chester: Splendid!
- Francis Phelan: Well, shovelin' dirt ain't all that splendid.
- Francis Phelan: [regarding Sandra] She a bum, or just a plain drunk?
- Rudy: She's been a bum all her life.
- Francis Phelan: [chuckles] No, nobody... 'been a bum all her life'. She had to be somethin' else before she was a bum.
- Oscar Reo: I think I know you two Turks.
- Francis Phelan: Well, you'd be thinkin' right. 'Cept you wasn't sportin' that pussy-tickler last time I seen ya.
- [first lines]
- Pee Wee: [gathered around a fire barrel] Oh God, it's too damn cold out here. Hey, Francis.
- Francis Phelan: Hey, Pee Wee.
- Pee Wee: Have you come back?
- Francis Phelan: Yeah. You, uh, seen Helen around?
- Pee Wee: No. I haven't seen her in a couple days.
- Francis Phelan: Well, I'll catch up with her.
- Reverend Chester: It's fine you're off the drink. You've got strong look about you today.
- Francis Phelan: Eh, just a false face for Halloween.
- Helen: Everything ails me.
- Francis Phelan: Oh, come on. At least you got to sing a song.
- Helen: Yeah, I did. I sang while Sandra was dying over there.
- Francis Phelan: Oh, come one. She was gonna die anyway. Her time was up.
- Helen: Oh, well, I don't believe that. I believe you die when you can't stand it any more. Take as much as you can, then you... You die when you can.
- Aldo Campione: Hey, where did you get them shoes?
- Francis Phelan: I found them.
- Aldo Campione: Goddamn it, them's nice shoes!
- Francis Phelan: That's why I wear 'em.
- Francis Phelan: [to his train conductor ghost] I real sorry that I hurt your head so bad. But I had good reasons, 'cause you know. I almost lost a finger.
- [holding up his pinky]
- Francis Phelan: I couldn't do anything right-handed for a long time. But I don't hold grudges for more than 5 years. See ya...
- Francis Phelan: [following her into an alley] You are you kidding. You got nowheres to go. You wanna get knocked over the head?
- Helen: It wouldn't be the worst that ever happened to me. Are you gonna hit me now?
- Francis Phelan: [shaking her by the head] I'm not gonna hit ya. Shh. I love you, soul mate. Don't go walkin' away from me. You'll be lost in the world.
- Helen: [kneeing in the church] Forgive me, for I have sinned. If you must call them sins, you know, I call them decisions. I'm not a drunk, and I'm not a whore, and I never let a man use me for money. You know, I went Dutch lots of times, and I... well, I would let them buy the drinks. But that's because it's a man's place to buy the drinks. But I never, ever betrayed anybody. And that's what counts with me. Of course, I know living with Francis was sinful in the eyes of some people, and I took a certain amount of liberty with the Commandments of the Church. But nobody's gonna compel me ever - I couldn't declare to anybody, not even you, St. Joseph - that loving Francis was sinful. Because it was probably... *the* greatest thing in my life.
- Rosskam: So, how do you like it?
- Francis Phelan: Like what?
- Rosskam: Sex business, woman stuff...
- Francis Phelan: Well, I don't think about it that much anymore. To tell you the truth, I'm over the hill.
- Rosskam: Over the hill? How old are you, 62?
- Francis Phelan: I'm not *that* old.
- Rosskam: 71 here. I don't go over no hills. Four, five times a night, I get it with the old woman, and in the daylight I go house to house, I get offers. I never went house to house. Listen, half my life I go house to house, and I know how it is. You get offers. Boy oh boy, you get offers.
- Katrina Dougherty: You know, a great poet once said that love enters through the eyes. You must be very careful not to see too much. Have you ever seen anyone faint?
- Young Francis Phelan: Faint? No.
- Katrina Dougherty: Then I shall faint for you, dear Francis.
- [swoons and collapses]
- Young Francis Phelan: [standing over her] You've done that pretty good.
- [now kneeling over her]
- Young Francis Phelan: You can get up now.
- [he lifts her up, Katrina opens her eyes slyly]
- Francis Phelan: Excuse me, lady, do you know where I can get a nice little turkey?
- Hooverville Resident: [just coming out of his house] What did you say to my wife?
- Francis Phelan: I asked her where I could get a turkey.
- Hooverville Resident: What for?
- Francis Phelan: Well, uh, my duck died.
- Francis Phelan: [suddenly seeing his ghosts] You goddamn spooks. You ain't real. You're dead! Or if you ain't, you ought to be. I'd rather be dying out in the weeds than standing here watching you pining away. *I'm* the one that's living. I'm the one that put *you* on the map! You don't know nothing that I don't know. See? So get your asses gone! I'm sick to death of looking at the bunch of youse anyway.
- Annie Phelan: [bringing him to his senses] Fran. Fran.
- Francis Phelan: Annie, I'd eat all the dirt in this yard for you. And all the weeds, and all the dog bones too, if you asked me.
- Annie Phelan: [lovingly] I think you probably ate all that already.
- Francis Phelan: [walking into the house] How are you doing, Margaret?
- Margaret 'Peg' Phelan: [defiantly] I'm doing fine. No thanks to you.
- Francis Phelan: Yep.
- Billy Phelan: Let's give the man a break, for chrissake. He just got here.
- Margaret 'Peg' Phelan: What break did he ever give me? Or you? You don't just pop up here one day and all is forgiven.
- Francis Phelan: I ain't expecting to be forgiven. I'm way past that.
- Margaret 'Peg' Phelan: Oh. So why have you come back here like a ghost, to force this scrawny turkey on us?
- Annie Phelan: That's twelve and a half pounds!
- Margaret 'Peg' Phelan: Why did you come here, is what I want to know. This is a home you didn't build.
- Francis Phelan: I built you. I built Bill. Helped to.
- Margaret 'Peg' Phelan: I wish you never did.
- Billy Phelan: Shut up! Rotten tongue of yours. Shut it the hell up.
- Rudy: You know why people call you a bum? Because it makes them feel better when they say it.
- Francis Phelan: Well, the truth can't hurt you. If you're a bum, you're a bum.
- Francis Phelan: I'm gonna get you that gravestone that you always wanted. You know what I'm gonna put on it? "Helen Marie Archer, a great soul."
- [last lines]
- Annie Phelan: [Francis remembering the home he never had] That's Danny's room. It's a nice big room. It gets the morning light.
- Francis Phelan: [entering a brightly decorated nursery] It's nice.
- Annie Phelan: The room's got some space to it. We could set up an extra cot.
- Francis Phelan: It's a mighty nice room. It get's the morning light.
- Francis Phelan: Do you wanna work with me today? Get some money. I had some last night, but I blew it. Get us a jug and a place to flop It could be cold tonight.
- Rudy: Say, do you wanna be buried under a stone like that?
- Francis Phelan: I never knew no bum buried under a gravestone.
- Rudy: I don't need me no stone. Just so's we don't have to die alone.
- Francis Phelan: Got a jug?
- Rudy: I got a dollar. The nurse up and - up and gave me a dollar.
- Francis Phelan: We're in business.
- Rudy: Work where?
- Francis Phelan: Up at the cemetery, shovelin' dirt. A fella told me they was hirin'.
- Rudy: Well, are they payin' money or - are they givein' you a free grave when you croak?
- Francis Phelan: Well, if it ain't money - forget it. I ain't shovelin' my own goddamn grave.
- Francis Phelan: Go by the mission and see if anybody knows where Helen is.
- Rudy: What is Helen's name?
- Francis Phelan: Helen!
- Rudy: I just like to know where I'm headin', that's all.
- Francis Phelan: You ain't known where you been headin' for 20 years.
- Rudy: Well, you got a point there.
- Harold Allen: Why did you kill me?
- Francis Phelan: I didn't mean to kill you.
- Harold Allen: Was that why you threw that stone that broke open my skull? My brains flowed out and I died.
- Rudy: Hi, Sandra. It's me, Rudy. Are you dead or just drunk?
- [to Francis]
- Rudy: She's just drunk. She can't hold it no more. She's a goddamn Eskimo.
- Francis Phelan: Whether she's an Eskimo or whether she ain't, she's going to freeze out here. Dogs will come along and eat her ass off.
- Young Francis Phelan: Miss Dougherty? Are you all right?
- Katrina Dougherty: I'm going downtown, Francis.
- Young Francis Phelan: Shouldn't you put on some clothes?
- Katrina Dougherty: Clothes?
- Francis Phelan: Swells and bums. They ain't no difference.
- Oscar Reo: Except that swells want to look like swells and bums want to look like bums.
- Francis Phelan: Is she a bum? Or, just a plain drunk?
- Rudy: She's been a bum all her life.
- Francis Phelan: No, Nobody's been a bum all their life. She had to be somethin' else before she was a bum.
- Rudy: Well, she's a whore, you know, there in Alaska.
- Francis Phelan: What about before that?
- Rudy: Well, I don't know. I guess maybe she was just a little kid.
- Francis Phelan: Well, that's somethin'. A little kid is somethin'. It ain't a bum and it ain't a whore.
- Oscar Reo: [singing] Come to me, for my dream of love is on, I love you, as I loved you, When you were sweet, When you you were sweet, Sixteen.
- Helen: [singing] He don't tell me, How I ought to be, He likes me just as I am, And when I feel blue, He's the one I go to, 'Cause his heart is as big as a ham, He's me pal, He's me pal...
- Rosskam: A bum is a bum. You I don't like.
- Francis Phelan: Well, I sort of liked you - and, I ain't half bad once you get to know me.
- Francis Phelan: I never could marry again. But, I did live with Helen, nine years, on and off. She nursed me when I was sick as a pup. She's a damn good woman.
- Annie Phelan: Where is she now?
- Francis Phelan: Downtown, somewhere. You know, she's like a little kid. She's gonna drop dead in the street someday if she keeps wandering off like that.
- Annie Phelan: She needs you. What do you need, Fran?
- Francis Phelan: I think, eh, need a shoelace.
- Young Francis Phelan: People with no clothes ain't what you call regular business, ma'am.
- Katrina Dougherty: Please don't call me "ma'am". It makes you sound like a servant. Call me Katrina.
- Francis Phelan: I'm so awful sorry, Annie. There's things to say, you know. Lousy things. Lousy. Lousy things. I never stopped lovin' you and the kids. I know that don't entitle me to nothin', you know. I don't want nothin'. I want my whole life just rememberin' things - here. Your elbows on the table. I want nothin', except just a cup of tea - and a sandwich. You still make that Irish Breakfast Tea?
- Billy Phelan: You got the feelings of a goddamn rattlesnake!
- Margaret 'Peg' Phelan: Don't you pardon me!
- [turns to Fran]
- Margaret 'Peg' Phelan: Pardon me, for having any feelings at all.
- Billy Phelan: Great stuff happened in them days.
- Francis Phelan: Yeah. Great stuff happenin' all the time.
- Annie Phelan: Do you want to come home permanent?
- Francis Phelan: I thought about it. I admit that. But, I see it wouldn't work out.
- Annie Phelan: Stranger things have happened.
- Francis Phelan: Name one.
- Rudy: You don't tell me nothin' that's true, man.
- Francis Phelan: Every lousy goddamn thing you can think of is true.