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Charles Bukowski
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relentless as the tarantula
they're not going to let you
sit at a front table
at some cafe in Europe
in the mid-afternoon sun.
if you do, somebody's going to
drive by and
spray your guts with a
submachine gun.
they're not going to let you
feel good
for very long
anywhere.
the forces aren't going to
let you sit around
fucking-off and
relaxing.
you've got to go
their way.
the unhappy, the bitter and
the vengeful
need their
fix - which is
you or somebody
anybody
in agony, or
better yet
dead, dropped into some
hole.
as long as there are
humans about
there is never going to be
any peace
for any individual
upon this earth or
anywhere else
they might
escape to.
all you can do
is maybe grab
ten lucky minutes
here
or maybe an hour
there.
something
is working toward you
right now, and
I mean you
and nobody but
you.
Charles Bukowski
Charles Baudelaire
Charles Dickens
Charles Manson
the new place
I type at a window that faces the street
on ground level and
if I fall out
the worst that can happen is a dirty shirt
under a tiny banana tree.
as I type people go by
mostly women
and I sit in my shorts
(without top)
and going by they
can't be sure I am not entirely
naked. so
I get these faces
which pretend they don't see
anything
but I think they do:
they see me as I
sweat the poem like beating an
ugly hog to death
as the sun begins to fail over
Sunset Blvd.
over the motel sign
where hot sweaty people from
Arkansas and Iowa
pay too much to sleep while
dreaming of movie stars.
there is a religionist next door
and he plays his radio loud
and it seems to have
very good tubes
so I am getting the
message.
and there's a white cat
chewed-up and neurotic
who calls 2 or 3 times a day
eats and leaves
but just looking at him
lifts the soul a little
like something on strings.
and the same young man from the nudist
magazine phones and we talk
and I get the idea
that we each hang up
mildly thinking each other
somewhat the fool.
now the woman calls me to dinner.
it's good to have food.
when you've starved enough
food always remains a
miracle.
the rent is a little higher here
but so far I've been able to
pay it
and that's a miracle too
like still maybe being sane
while thinking of guns and sidewalks
and old ladies in libraries.
there are still
small things to do
like rip this sheet from the typer
go in and eat
stay alive this way.
there are lots of curtains here
and now the woman has walked in
she's rocking back and forth
in the rocker behind me
a bit angry
the food is getting cold and
I've got to go
she doesn't understand that
I've got to finish this thing
but it's just a poor little neighborhood
not much place for Art,
whatever that is, and
I hear sprinklers
there's a shopping basket
a boy on roller skates.
I quit I quit
for the miracle of food and
maybe nobody ever angry
again, this place and
all the other places.
Charles Bukowski
Charles Baudelaire
Charles Dickens
Charles Manson
the crunch
Too much
too little
or not enough
too fat
too thin
or nobody
laughter or
tears
or immaculate
non-concern
haters
lovers
armies running through streets of blood
waving winebottles
bayoneting and fucking virgins
or an old guy in a cheap room
with a photograph of Marilyn Monroe
many old guys in cheap rooms without
any photographs at all
many old women rubbing rosaries
when they'd prefer to be rubbing cocks
there is a loneliness in this world so great
that you can see it in the slow movements of
the hands of a clock
there is a loneliness in this world so great
that you can see it blinking in neon signs
in Vegas, in Baltimore, in Munich
there are people so tired
so strafed
so mutilated by love or no
love
that buying a bargain can of tuna
in a supermarket
is their greatest moment
their greatest victory
we don't need new governments
new revolutions
we don't need new men
new women
we don't need new ways
wife-swaps
waterbeds
good Columbian
coke
water pipes
dildoes
rubbers with corkscrew stems
watches that give you the date
people are not good to each other
one on one.
Marx be damned
the sin is not the totality of certain systems.
Christianity be damned
the sin is not the killing of a God.
people are just not good to each other.
we are afraid
we think that hatred means strength
we think that New York City is the greatest
city in America.
what we need is less brilliance
what we need is less instruction
what we need are less poets
what we need are less Bukowskies
what we need are less Billy Grahams
what we need is more
beer
a typist
more finches
more green-eyed whores who don't eat your heart
like a vitamin pill
we don't think about the terror of one person
aching in one place
alone
untouched
unspoken to
watering a plant
being without a telephone that will never
ring
because there isn't one.
more haters than lovers
slices of doom like taffeta
people are not good to each other
people are not good to each other
people are not good to each other
and the beads swing and the clouds cloud
and the dogs piss upon the roses
and the killer beheads the child like taking a bite
out of an ice cream cone
and the ocean comes in and out
in and out
under the direction of a senseless moon
and people are not good to each other.
Charles Bukowski
Charles Baudelaire
Charles Dickens
Charles Manson
the lucky ones
stuck in the rain on the freeway, 6:15 p.m., stop, then
first gear, then stop, these are the lucky ones, these
are the employed, most with their radios on while lighting
cigarettes, trying not to think.
this is a large portion of our civilization and as beings
once lived in trees and caves now they very often live
inside of automobiles upon freeways
as the world news is heard over and over, the popular
songs, the rock songs, the love songs, all the songs,
love songs, love love love as
we shift from first gear to neutral and back to first.
there's a poor fellow stalled in the fast lane, hood up,
he's standing up against the freeway fence
a newspaper over his head in the rain
the other cars force around his car, pull into the next
lane against cars determined to shut them off.
in the lane to my right a driver is being followed by a
police car with red and blue lights blinking -- this one
can't be a speeding ticket as
suddenly the rain comes down in a giant wash and all the
cars stop and
even with the windows up I can smell somebody's clutch
burning out
hope it's not mine as
the wall of water diminishes and we go back to first
gear as we are a long way from Johnny Carson's monologue
tonight
we are a long way away from anything as I have memorized
the shape of the car in front of me and the shape of the
driver's head
what
I can see of it from above the headrest of his seat and
his license number: STK 405 and his bumper sticker:
HAVE YOU HUGGED YOUR RAT TODAY?
suddenly I have the urge to urinate while 17 miles from
where I live as another wall of water comes down and the
man on the radio announces that there will be a 70 percent
chance of showers tomorrow night.
Charles Bukowski
Charles Baudelaire
Charles Dickens
Charles Manson
Metamorphosis
a girlfriend came in
built me a bed
scrubbed and waxed the kitchen floor
scrubbed the walls
vacuumed
cleaned the toilet
the bathtub
scrubbed the bathroom floor
and cut my toenails and
my hair.
then
all on the same day
the plumber came and fixed the kitchen faucet
and the toilet
and the gas man fixed the heater
and the phone man fixed the phone.
noe I sit in all this perfection.
it is quiet.
I have broken off with all 3 of my girlfriends.
I felt better when everything was in
disorder.
it will take me some months to get back to normal:
I can't even find a roach to commune with.
I have lost my rythm.
I can't sleep.
I can't eat.
I have been robbed of
my filth.
Charles Bukowski
Charles Baudelaire
Charles Dickens
Charles Manson
Hooray Say The Roses
hooray say the roses, today is blamesday
and we are red as blood.
hooray say the roses, today is Wednesday
and we bloom wher soldiers fell
and lovers too,
and the snake at the word.
hooray say the roses, darkness comes
all at once, like lights gone out,
the sun leaves dark continents
and rows of stone.
hooray say the roses, cannons and spires,
birds, bees, bombers, today is Friday
the hand holding a medal out the window,
a moth going by, half a mile an hour,
hooray hooray
hooray say the roses
we have empires on our stems,
the sun moves the mouth:
hooray hooray hooray
and that is why you like us.
Charles Bukowski
Charles Baudelaire
Charles Dickens
Charles Manson
Bluebird by Charles Bukowski
there’s a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I’m too tough for him,
I say, stay in there, I’m not going
to let anybody see
you.
there’s a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I pour whiskey on him and inhale
cigarette smoke
and the whores and the bartenders
and the grocery clerks
never know that
he’s
in there.
there’s a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I’m too tough for him,
I say,
stay down, do you want to mess
me up?
you want to screw up the
works?
you want to blow my book sales in
Europe?
there’s a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I’m too clever, I only let him out
at night sometimes
when everybody’s asleep.
I say, I know that you’re there,
so don’t be
sad.
then I put him back,
but he’s singing a little
in there, I haven’t quite let him
die
and we sleep together like
that
with our
secret pact
and it’s nice enough to
make a man
weep, but I don’t
weep, do
you?
Charles Bukowski
Charles Baudelaire
Charles Dickens
Charles Manson
Ricardo Vazquez
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