Edited by John Martin

These poems are part of an archive of unpublished work that Charles Bukowski left to be published after his death.

Grateful acknowledgment is made to John Martin, who edited these poems.

contents

I live near the

slaughterhouse

and am ill

with thriving.

come on in!

nothing but a scarf

literary chitchat

this machine is a fountain

200 years

residue

Coronado Street: 1954

a vision

cut-rate drugstore: 4:30 p.m.

you can’t tell a turkey by its feathers

too early!

the green Cadillac

I’m not all-knowing but …

in the clubhouse

a famished orphan sits somewhere in the mind

form letter

first family

a real thing, a good woman

a child’s bedtime story

working out in Hades

half-a-goldfish

lousy mail

from the Dept. of English

and poems have too

poets to the rescue

red hot mail

some personal thoughts

he’s a dog

tremor

my Mexican buddy

strangers at the racetrack

will you tiptoe through the tulips with me?

the novel life

thanks for your help

I have continued regardless

balloons

moving toward the dark

the real thing

she looked at me and asked,

did you?

did you?

did you?

on the cuff

alone again

fooling Marie (the poem)

the copulation blues

the faithful wife

once in a while

another high-roller

the fucking horses

hello there!

the fuck-master

my personal psychologist

jealousy

her guy

dead poet’s wife

scrambled legs

endless love

down and out on the boardwalk

sex sister

to the ladies no longer here

the nude dancer

Ma Barker loves me

here we go again

do you believe that a man can be taught to write?

hail and farewell

weep

it’s a lonely world

of frightened people.

a note upon modern poesy

the end of an era

Paris in the spring

alone in this chair

talking about the poets

was Li Po wrong?

operator

a note from Hades in the mailbox

on the sunny banks of the university

vacation in Greece

the spill

the last salamander

learning the ropes

bombed away

the swimming pool will be going here

a bright boy

my turn

skinny-dipping

a close call

like a rock

the waitress at the yogurt shop

one out in the minor leagues

the little girls hissed

I dreamt

the old couple next door

men without women

the “Beats”

hurry slowly

hello and goodbye

I will never have

a house in the valley

with little stone men

on the lawn.

don’t call me, I’ll call you

taking the 8 count

going going gone

this is where they come for what’s left of your soul

hot night

the x-bum

something cares

my cats

6:30 a.m.

what I need

gender benders

after many nights

good morning, how are you?

a reader of my work

Sumatra Cum Laude

the disease of existence

another comeback

two nights before my 72nd birthday

have we come to this?

old poem

older

closing time

no leaders, please

everything hurts

husk

my song

cancer

blue

twilight musings

mind and heart

COME ON IN!

I live near the

slaughterhouse

and am ill

with thriving.

come on in!

welcome to my wormy hell.

the music grinds off-key.

fish eyes watch from the wall.

this is where the last happy shot was

fired.

the mind snaps closed

like a mind snapping

closed.

we need to discover a new will and a new

way.

we’re stuck here now

listening to the laughter of the

gods.

my temples ache with the fact of

the facts.

I get up, move about, scratch

myself.

I’m a pawn.

I am a hungry prayer.

my wormy hell welcomes you.

hello. hello there. come in, come on in!

plenty of room here for us all,

sucker.

we can only blame ourselves so

come sit with me in the dark.

it’s half-past

nowhere

everywhere.

nothing but a scarf

long ago, oh so long ago, when

I was trying to write short stories

and there was one little magazine which printed

decent stuff

and the lady editor there usually sent me

encouraging rejection slips

so I made a point to

read her monthly magazine in the public

library.

I noticed that she began to feature

the same writer

for the lead story each

month and

it pissed me off because I thought that I could

write better than that

fellow.

his work was facile and bright but it had no

edge.

you could tell that he had never had his nose rubbed into

life, he had just

glided over it.

next thing I knew, this ice-skater-of-a-writer was

famous.

he had begun as a copy boy

on one of the big New York

magazines

(how the hell do you get one of those

jobs?)

then he began appearing in some of the best

ladies’ magazines

and in some of the respected literary

journals.

then after a couple of early books

out came a little volume, a sweet

novelette, and he was truly

famous.

it was a tale about high society and

a young girl and it was

delightful and charming and just a bit

naughty.

Hollywood quickly made a movie out of

it.

then the writer bounced around Hollywood

from party to party

for a few years.

I saw his photo again and again:

a little elf-man with huge

eyeglasses.

and he always wore a long dramatic

scarf.

but soon he went back to New York and to all the

parties there.

he went to every important party thereafter for years

and to

some that weren’t very

important.

then he stopped writing altogether and just went

to parties.

he drank or doped himself into oblivion almost

every night.

his once slim frame more than doubled in

size.

his face grew heavy and he no longer looked

like the young boy with the quick and dirty

wit but more like an

old frog.

the scarf was still on display but his hats were

too large and came down almost to his

eyes;

all you noticed was his

twisted

lurid

grin.

the society ladies still liked to drag him

around New York

one on each arm

and

drinking like he did, he didn’t live

to enjoy his old age.

so

he died

and was quickly

forgotten

until somebody found what they claimed was his secret

diary / novel

and then all the famous people in

New York were very

worried

and they should have been worried because when it

was published

out came all the dirty

laundry.

but I still maintain that he never really did know how to

write; just what and

when and about

whom.

slim, thin

stuff.

ever so long ago, after reading

one of his short stories,

after dropping the magazine to the floor,

I thought,

Jesus Christ, if this is what they

want,

from now on

I might as well write for

the rats and the spiders

and the air and just for

myself.

which, of course, is exactly what

I did.

literary chitchat

my friend Tom, he liked to come over

and he’d say, “let’s go get a coffee.”

and my girlfriend would say, “you guys

going to talk that literary stuff again?”

and we’d go to this place where you paid

for your first coffee and all the refills were

free

and we’d get a seat by the window and he

would begin:

Hemingway, Faulkner, Fitzgerald, Dos

Passos mainly but others got in there

too: e.e. cummings, Ezra Pound, Dreiser,

Jeffers, Céline and so forth.

although I will admit I was mostly a

listener and wondered what he was

really getting at, if anything, I

continued to listen and

drink coffee after

coffee.

once he said, “look, I’ll take you to the

place Fitzgerald stayed at for a while

during his Hollywood period.”

“all right,” I said and we got into his

car and he drove me there and pointed

it out:

“Fitzgerald lived there.”

“all right,” I said and then he drove us

back for more coffee.

Tom was truly excited about these

literary figures of the past.

I was too, to an extent,

but as Tom talked on and on about

them

and the coffees continued unabated

my interest began to wane, more than

wane.

I began to want to get rid of

Tom.

it was easy.

one day I wrote a poem about Tom

and it was published and he read

it

and after that

we enjoyed no more coffees

together.

Tom had been working on a

biography of me

and that ended that.

then another writer came along

and he drank my wine

and didn’t talk about Hemingway,

Fitzgerald, Faulkner, etc.,

he talked about himself

and ended up writing a not-very-

satisfactory biography

of me.

I should have stuck with Tom.

no, I should have gotten rid of

both of them.

which is exactly what I have

done.

this machine is a fountain

my system is always the same:

keep it loose

write a great number of

poems

try with all your

heart and

don’t worry about the

bad

ones.

keep it going

keep it

hot

forget about immortality

if you ever

remembered

it.

the sound of this machine is

good.

much paper

more desire.

just

hammer away and wait for lady

luck.

what a

bargain.

200 years

hunched over this white sheet of paper

at 4 in the afternoon. I

received a letter from a young poet this morning

informing me that I was one of the most

important writers of the last

200 years.

well, now, one can’t believe that

especially if one has felt as I have

this past month,

walking about,

thinking,

surely I am going crazy,

and then thinking,

I can’t write

anymore.

and then I remember the factories,

the production lines,

the warehouses,

the time clocks,

overtime and layoffs

and flirtations with the Mexican girls

on the assembly line;

each day everything was carefully planned,

there was always something to do,

there was more than enough to do,

and if you didn’t keep up,

if you weren’t clever and swift and

obedient

you were out with the sparrows and

the bums.

writing’s different, you’re floating out there in the

white air, you’re hanging from the high-wire,

you’re sitting up in a tree and they’re working at

the trunk with a power

saw …

there’s no silk scarf about one’s neck,

no English accent,

no remittance checks from aristocratic ladies in Europe

with blind and impotent

husbands.

it’s more like a fast hockey game

or putting on the gloves with a man

50 pounds heavier and ten years

younger, or

it’s like steering a ship through the fog

with a mad damsel clinging to your

neck

and all along you know you’ve gotten away

with some quite obvious stuff, that

you’ve been given undeserved credit, for stuff

that you either wrote offhand or

hardly meant or hardly cared

about.

well, it helps to be

lucky.

yet, on the other hand, you have sometimes

done it as you always knew it should

be done, and you knew then that it was

as good as it could be done,

and that maybe you had done it better,

in a way,

than anybody else had done it for a long time

and

you allowed yourself to feel

good about that

for a moment or

two.

they put the pressure on you

with statements about 200 years,

and when only one individual says it, that’s all

right

but when 2 or 3 or 4 say it—

that’s when they tend to open the door to a

kookoo bin.

they tell you to give up cigarettes and

booze, and then they tell you that you

have 25 more good years ahead of you and

then

perhaps ten more years to enjoy your old

age

as you suck on

the rewards and

memories.

Patchen’s gone, we need you, man,

we all need you for that

good feeling just above the

belly button—

knowing that you are there in some small room in

northern California writing poems and

killing flies with a torn

flyswatter.

they can kill you,

the praisers can kill you,

the young girls can kill you,

as the blue-eyed boys in English depts.

who send warm letters

handwritten

on lined paper

can kill you,

and they’re all correct:

2 packs a day and the bottle

can kill you

too.

of course,

anything can kill you

and something eventually

will. all I can say is that

today

I have just inserted a new

typewriter ribbon

into this old machine

and I am pleased with the way it

works and that makes for more than just an

ordinary day, thank

you.

residue

there’s an old movie

based on a Hemingway short story

I saw the beginning of it

again on late night /

early morning tv

but the fellow who plays

Hem

his ears aren’t right

neither are

his chin

his hair

his voice;

and there’s this lovely

wench

in the film

with perfect buns

whose role it is to

endure his precious

literary abuse

while he slowly dies in the

African jungle.

I click the movie off.

of course, I never met

Hemingway.

maybe he was like that fellow.

I hope

not.

then I look about my bedroom and

think, Jesus Jesus,

why am I so upset by this

lousy tv movie?

what did I want them to make him

look like?

act like?

he was just a journalist from

Michigan who liked to shoot

big game

and his last kill was his

biggest;

surely he would have deserved the

nice buns

and the adoring eyes

of that actress who

he never saw and

who

in real life

later

drank herself to

death.

(the actor

who plays Hem

in the film is

still around

however

but barely

functioning.)

I guess when I look at that

movie

all I can think of to say

is:

bwana, bring me a

drink.

Coronado Street: 1954

listen, I been in the navy and I never heard cussing like you and

your girlfriend, man, and it lasts all night, every night.

we got religious people here, children, decent working folk, you’re

keeping them awake every night and look at this place! everything’s

broken, when I evict you you’ve got to pay to replace everything, buddy!

what do you mean, you don’t have no fucking money?

what do you buy all that booze with?

credit?

don’t give me that!

listen, I want it so quiet in here tonight we’ll be able to hear the

church mice pray!

what’s that?

well, up yours too, buddy!

and you wanna know what?

I saw your old lady sucking some guy’s banana in the alley!

you don’t give a damn?

what do you give a damn about?

nothing?

what kind of shit is that, nothing!

did you get a lobotomy somewhere along the way?

I got a good mind to wipe up the floor with you!

you say I’m the one with a lobotomy?

hey, don’t go closing the door on me, pal!

I own this fucking place!

OPEN UP, BUDDY! I’M COMING IN!

WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU LAUGHING AT?

HEY, WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU LAUGHING AT?

a vision

we are in the clubhouse

3rd race, 83 degrees in June,

they have just sent in a 40-to-1 shot

in a maiden race,

the tote has clicked 3 or 4 times,

the old general feeling of futility

has arrived early

and then a girl walks by

to the window to make a bet

her skirt is slit

almost to the waist

and as she walks

this

most beautiful leg

is exposed

it sneaks out as she walks

flashes and vanishes.

every male in the clubhouse

watches that leg.

the girl is with a woman

who looks like her mother

and her mother keeps close

to the side of the skirt

that is slit,

trying to block our view.

the girl makes her bet

turns and now the leg is on

the other side

along with her mother.

the girl disappears down an

aisle to her seat

as all around us

there is a rising,

silent applause.

then the applause stops

and like forsaken children

we go back to our

Racing Forms.

cut-rate drugstore: 4:30 p.m.

this woman at the counter ahead of me

was buying four pairs of panties:

yellow, pink, blue and orange.

the lady at the register kept picking up

the panties and

counting them:

one, two, three, four.

then she counted them again:

one, two, three, four.

will there be anything else?

she asked the lady who was buying the

panties.

no, that’s it, she answered.

no cigarettes or anything?

no, that’s it.

the woman at the register

rang up the sale

collected the money

gave change

looked off into the distance

for a bit

and then she bent under the counter

and got a bag

and put the panties in this bag

one at a time—

first the blue pair, then the yellow,

then the orange, then the pink.

she looked at me next:

how are you doing today?

fair, I said.

is there anything else?

cigarettes?

all I want is what you see in front of

you.

I had hemorrhoid ointment

laxatives

and a box of paper clips.

she rang it up, took my money, made

change, bagged my things, handed them

to me.

have a nice day, she did not say.

and you too,

I said.

you can’t tell a turkey by its feathers

son, my father said, if you only had some

ambition! you have no

get up and go! no

drive!

it’s hard for me to believe that you are really

my son.

yeah, I

said.

I mean, he went on, how are you going to

make it?

your mother is worried sick and the neighbors

think you’re some kind of

imbecile.

what are you going to

do?

we can’t take care of you all your

life!

I’m 15 now, I told him, I won’t be around

much longer.

but look at you, you just sit around in your room

all day! other

boys have jobs, paper routes, Jim Stover works

as an usher at the

Bayou!

HOW IN THE HELL ARE YOU GOING TO

SURVIVE IN THIS

WORLD?

I don’t

know …

you make me SICK! sometimes, having a son like

you, I wish I was

dead.

well, he did die, he died more than 30 years

ago.

and last year I paid

$59,000 income

tax.

too early!

there are some people who will

phone a man at 7 a.m.

when he is desperately sick and

hungover.

I always greet

these idiots

with a few violent

words

and the slamming

down of the

receiver

knowing that their

morning eagerness

means that

they retired early

and thus wasted the

preceding

night

(and most likely

the preceding days, weeks and

years).

that they could

imagine

that

I’d want to

converse with

them

at 7 a.m.

is an insult

to

whatever

intelligent life

is left

in our dwindling

universe.

the green Cadillac

he hung the green Cadillac

almost straight up and down

standing on its nose

against the phone pole

next to the

All-American Hamburger

Hut.

I was

in the laundromat

with my girlfriend when

we heard the sound of it.

when we got there

the driver had

dropped out of the car

and run off.

and there was the

green Caddy

standing straight

up and down

against

the phone pole.

it was one of the most

magnificent sights

I had seen

in years:

in the 9 p.m. moonlight

it just stood there—

the people gathered

the people stood back

knowing the Caddy

could come crashing down

at any moment

but it didn’t

it just stood there

straight as an arrow

alongside

the phone pole.

how the hell

they were going to get

that down

without wrecking it

was beyond me.

my girlfriend wanted to

wait and see how

they did it

but we hadn’t

had dinner

yet

and I

talked her into

going back into the

laundromat and then

back to my place.

I was not

mechanically inclined

and it pissed

me off

to watch people

who were.

anyhow

about noon

the next day

when I went out to

buy a newspaper

the green Caddy

was gone.

there was just

an old bum

at the counter

in the All-American

having a coffee

but I had already seen

the real miracle

and I

walked back to

my place

satisfied.

I’m not all-knowing but …

one of the problems is

that when most people

sit down to write a poem

they think,

“now I am going to write a

poem”

and then

they go on to write a poem

that

sounds like a poem

or what they think

a poem should sound like.

this is one of their

problems.

of course, there are other

problems:

those writers of poems

that sound like poems

think that they then must

go around

reading them

to other people.

this, they say, is done

for status and recognition

(they are careful

not to mention

vanity

or the need for

instantaneous

approbation

from some

sparse, addled

crowd).

the best poems

it seems to me

are written out of

an ultimate

need.

and once the poem is

written,

the only need

after that

is to write

another.

and the silence

of the printed page

is the

best response

to a finished

work.

in decades past

I once warned

some poet-friends

of mine

about the masturbatory

nature of poetry readings

done just

for the applause of

a handful of

idiots.

“isolate yourself and

do your work and if you

must mix, then do it

with those who

have no interest at all

in what you consider

so

important.”

such anger,

such a self-righteous

response

did I receive then

from my poet-friends

that it seemed to me

that I had exactly

proved my

point.

after that,

we all drifted

apart.

and that solved just

one of my

problems

and I suppose

just one of

theirs.

in the clubhouse

he is behind me,

talking to somebody:

“well, I like the 5 horse, he closed well last

time, I like a horse who can close.

but you know, you gotta kinda consider

the 4 and the 12.

the 4 needed his last race and look at

him, he’s reading 40-to-1 now.

the 12’s got a chance too.

and look at the 9, he looks really good,

really got a shine to his skin.

then too, you also gotta consider the 7 …”

every now and then I consider murdering

somebody, it just flashes in my mind for a

moment, then I dismiss it and rightfully

so.

I considered murdering the man who

belonged to the voice I heard,

then I worked on dismissing the thought.

and to make sure, I changed my seat,

I moved far down to my left,

I found a seat between a woman wearing a

sun shade and a young man violently

chewing on a mouthful of

gum.

then I felt

better.

a famished orphan sits somewhere in the mind

a heavyweight fighter called Young Stribling

was killed in the ring

so long ago

that I am certain

that I am the only one remembering him

tonight.

I am thinking of nobody else.

I sit here in this room and stare at the

lamp

and I think,

Stribling, Stribling.

outside

the starved palms continue to

decay

while in here

I remember and

watch a cigarette lighter,

an empty glass and a

wristwatch propped delicately on its

side.

Stribling.

son-of-a-bitch,

what causes me to think

about things like this?

I really don’t need to know,

yet I wonder.

form letter

dear sir:

thank you for your manuscript

but this is to inform you

that I have no special influence

with any editor or publisher

and if I did

I would never dream of telling

them who or what

to publish.

I myself have never mailed any

of my work to anybody but

an editor or a publisher.

despite the fact that

my own work

was rejected for

decades,

I still never considered

mailing my work to

another writer

hoping that this other

writer might help me

get published.

and although I have

read some of what you

have mailed me

I return the work without

comment

except to ask

how did you get my

address?

and the effrontery

to mail me such

obvious

crap?

if you think me unkind,

fine.

and thank you for telling

me that I am a

great writer.

now you will have a

chance to re-evaluate

that opinion

and to choose another

victim.

first family

it’s unholy.

I appear to be

lost. I walk from room to room and

there aren’t many (2 or 3)

and she is in the dark room

snoring, I can’t see her but her

mouth is open and her hair is gray

poor thing

and she doesn’t mean me harm

least of all

does she mean me

harm,

and in the other room are

pink lips pink ears

on a head like a cabbage

and a child’s blocks on the floor like

leprosy

and she also doesn’t mean me any harm at

all,

but I cannot sleep and I sit in the kitchen

with a big black fly

that goes around and around and around

like a piece of snot grown a

heart,

and I am puzzled and not given to

cruelty (I’d like to think)

and I sit with the fly

under this yellow light

and we smoke a cigar and drink beer

and share the calendar with a frightened cat:

“ katzen-unsere hausfrende: 1965.”

I am a poor father because I want to stay alive as a

man but perhaps I never was a

man.

I suck on the cigar and suddenly the fly is gone

and there are just

the 3 of us

here.

a real thing, a good woman

I put the book down and ask:

why are they always writing about

the bulls, the bullfighters?

those who have never seen

them?

and as I break the web of the

spider reaching for my wine,

the hum of bombers

breaking the solace, I decide

I must write an impatient letter to my

priest about some 3rd St.

whore

who keeps calling me up at 3 in

the morning.

ass full of

splinters,

thinking of pocketbook poets

and the priest,

I go over to the typewriter

next to the window

to see to my letter

and look look

the sky’s black as ink

and my wife says Brock, for

Christ’s sake,

the typewriter all night,

how can I sleep? and I crawl quickly

into bed and

kiss her hair and say

sorry sorry sorry

sometimes I get excited

I don’t know why …

a friend of mine has

written a book about

Manolete …

who’s that? nobody, kid,

somebody dead

like Chopin or our old mailman

or a dog,

go to sleep, go to sleep,

and I kiss her and rub her

head,

a good woman,

and soon she sleeps as I wait

for morning.

a child’s bedtime story

unsaid, said the snail.

untold, said the tortoise.

doesn’t matter, said the tiger.

obey me, said the father.

be loyal, said the country.

watch me climb, said the vine.

doesn’t matter, said the tiger.

untold, said the tortoise,

unsaid, said the snail.

I’ll run, said the mouse.

I’ll hide, said the cat.

I’ll fly, said the sparrow.

I’ll swim, said the whale.

obey and be loyal, said the

father and

everybody shut up! roared the

Queen.

the night came and all

the lights went out

as the cities

burned.

now, go to

sleep.

working out in Hades

holy Christ, I was on fire then and

I’d tell that whore I lived with on Beacon Street

starving and drinking

I’d tell her that I had something great and mysterious

going for me,

in fact, when I got really drunk I’d pace the floor in my

dirty torn shorts and ripped undershirt and

say more in desperation than belief: “I’m a fucking

genius and nobody knows it but

me!”

I thought this was rather humorous but she’d say, “honey, you’re

full of shit, pour us another drink!”

she was crazy too and now and then an empty bottle would come

flying toward my head.

(she

missed most of the time)

but

when she bounced one off my skull I’d ignore it, and pour another

drink because

after all, when you’re immortal, nothing

matters.

and besides, she had one of the finest pair of legs I’d ever

seen

in those high-heeled shoes and with her slender

ankles and her great knees glimmering in the

smoky drunken light.

she helped me through some of the worst times and if she was

here now we’d both laugh our goddamned asses

off

knowing it was all so true and real, and yet that somehow it

wasn’t real at

all.

half-a-goldfish

we were out on the town

and we

went to this nice

house, lovely couple, etc.

anyhow, there were 7 or

8 of us and a jug of really

cheap wine

came out and then some

snacks, and then the man

got up and came back with

3 live goldfish and he said,

“watch this!”

and he put them in a large

fish tank

and the next thing I knew

there were 6 or 7 heads

down there glued to the fish tank

including my girlfriend’s

and the soft light from the tank

shone on all the faces

and in all the eyes,

and one of the men went,

“ah!” and one of the girls

went, “oooh!”

some terrible thing was eating the

goldfish.

then somebody said, “look,

there’s just half-a-goldfish

left and he’s still swimming

around!”

I said, “why don’t you fucking

party animals

get up off that rug

and help me finish this

cheap wine?”

12 or 14 eyes turned and looked at

me. then one at a time

the people moved away from

the fish tank and came back and sat

down at the table

again.

then they began a discussion about

the merits of

little literary

magazines.

lousy mail

the time comes when the tank runs

dry and you have to

refill

if you can.

the vulture swoops low over

you

as you open the manila envelope

from the ivy league university and

read:

“we have to pass on this batch of poems

but we are reading again in the

Fall.”

“you were rejected?” asks my

wife.

“yes.”

“well, fuck them,” she says.

now, there’s loyalty!

the vulture pauses in mid-flight,

defecates,

and flies out of the dining room

window.

and I think, it’s nice that they’ll be

reading again in the

Fall.

from the Dept. of English

we are surprised:

you used to jab with the left

then throw a left hook to the body

followed by an

overhand right.

we liked that

but we like your new way too:

where you can’t tell where

the next punch

is coming

from.

to change your style like that when you’re

not exactly a kid

anymore,

I think that takes some

doing.

anyhow, enough chitchat.

we’re accepting your poems

for our departmental Literary Journal

and, by the way,

you are one of the poets selected for

class discussion

in our Contemporary Poetry Series.

no shit, baby?

well, suck my

titties.

and poems have too

don’t worry, Dostoevsky,

the fish and the hills and the harbor

and the girls and the horses and the

alleys and the nights and the dogs

and the knives and the poisons and

the wines and the midgets and the

gamblers and the lights and the guns

and the lies and the sacrifices

and the flies and the frogs and the

flags and the doors and the windows

and the stairways and the cigarettes

and the hotels and myself have been

around a long time.

just like you.

poets to the rescue

the night the poets dropped by to say

hello

was at the time

that terrible time when

the ladies on the telephone

were screaming their fury

at me.

the night the poets came by to say

hello

I offered them cigarettes

as they talked about the

poet

who traveled all the way to Paris

in order to be able

to select the contents

of his next book

and we smiled at that

the poets and I

as we remembered starvation

dark mornings

deadly noons

evenings of elephantine

misery.

the night the poets came by to say

hello

we also mused about whatever happened to

Barney Google with the googly

eyes: he probably died for the love of

a strumpet as many good men

have

or went to London and walked in the

fog

waiting for

what?

the night the poets came by to say

hello

the walls were stained mellow with

grief

and beakers of curdled wine

dusty with dead spiders

sat about like memories best

forgotten.

the poets insisted then that it was best

not to think too much about things

or remember too much

but best just to sit around

in the evenings

and smoke our cigarettes and

drink our

beer

and talk quietly about

simple

things.

the poets

left soon after that

but the phone kept ringing

and I stood there frozen

as the ladies screamed their fury

at me.

what they wanted I didn’t have

and what I had

they didn’t want.

red hot mail

I continue to receive many letters

from young ladies.

evidently they have read some of

my books

but

they hardly ever

mention this.

many of their letters are

on pink or red

stationery

and they inform me that

they want to

kiss my lips and

they want to

come and stay with me

and

they say they will do anything

and everything

for and to me for

as long as

I can keep up with

them.

also, the younger ones are quick

to mention their

age: 21, 22, 23.

these letters are

fascinating, of

course,

but I always trash

them

for I know that all things

have their price

especially when they

are advertised as being

free.

besides,

what does it all mean?

bugs fuck, birds

fuck, horses

fuck, maybe some day they’ll

find that

even wind, water and

rocks

fuck.

and

where were all these eager

girls

when I was starving,

broke, young and

alone?

they were

not born yet, of

course.

I can’t blame them now

for

that.

but I do blame the girls

of my youth

for ignoring me and

for bedding down with all the

other

milkfish souls.

those other lads, I suppose,

were grateful then to

sink their spike into

any willing thing that

moved.

I only wish now some lass had

chanced upon me then

when I so needed her hair blowing in my

face

and her eyes smiling into mine,

when I so needed

that wild music

and that wild female willingness

to be

undone.

but they left me to sit alone

in tiny rented rooms

with only the company

of elderly landladies

and the comings and goings

of unsympathetic

roaches, they

left me terribly alone with

suicide mornings and

park bench

nights.

and now that

they are old

and

I am old

I don’t want to know

them

now

or even to know

their

daughters

even though

the gods

in their infinite wisdom

still refuse to

let me

forget and

rest.

some personal thoughts

they’re right: maybe it’s been too easy just writing about myself and

horses and drinking, but then I’m not trying to prove anything. taking

long walks lately has been pleasant and although my desire for the female

remains, I find that I needn’t always be on the lookout for new conquests.

riding the same mare need not be boring. let the wild young fillies be a

problem for other men. I am often satisfied just being alone. I now find

people more amusing than disgusting (am I weakening?) and although

I still have nights and days of depression the typewriter does not fail me.

readers expect continual growth from their poets but at this time just

holding (the fort, haha) seems miraculous. long walks, yes. and the ability

not to care—at times—as our society erupts and struggles does not mean

that I am the victim of artistic loss. solitary evenings behind drawn blinds,

being neither rich nor poor, can be satisfying. will madness arrive on

schedule? I don’t know and I don’t seek an answer—just a small quiet

space between not knowing, not wanting to know and finally finding out.

he’s a dog

who? Chinaski? he hates fags and women.

he’s a drunk. he beats his wife. he’s a Nazi.

he only writes about sex and drinking. who

cares about that?

and he’s a nasty drunk.

I don’t understand what people see in his

writing.

I am the real genius and now

Chinaski has asked his publishers not to

publish me!

I’ve known some of the greatest writers

of our time!

Chinaski has met nobody.

I got him his start!

I got him included in that prestigious

anthology!

how does he repay me?

he writes unflattering things about

me.

and he claims he’s lived with all

those beautiful women.

have you ever seen his face?

who would bed down a man

like that?

and he’s had no education, no formal

training.

he has no idea what a stanza

is.

or for that matter—a line

break.

he just begins at the top

of the page and runs on to the

bottom.

and he says things like,

“Shakespeare bores me.”

Shakespeare!

imagine that!

and the only people he cares to see

now are the Hollywood stars!

he doesn’t want to see anybody

else.

well, I don’t want to see him

either.

I remember when he lived

in rooms the size of a

closet.

now that he has had a few books

published

he’s too good for the

rest of us!

look, I’m tired of talking about

Chinaski.

I want you to look at these

poems here.

my Collected Works,

my work of a lifetime.

I sent them to Chinaski for a

reading,

asked for a foreword or

at least a

blurb.

that was two months ago and

not a word from him

since.

not even a sign that

he’s received the

stuff.

and I got him his start!

I got him in that prestigious anthology!

and then he asked his publishers not

to publish me!

tremor

at 9:50 the dogs started barking.

a few minutes later there was an earthquake

near Palm Springs.

the television stations break into their

programs with the news.

then the radio stations begin belaboring

the situation and

the earthquake experts at Caltech are

asked for their opinion.

the announcers are in their element.

phones begin to ring

in radio stations all

over the city.

yes, it was a quake.

yes, there will be aftershocks.

yes, we should check for gas leaks

and run a supply of water into the tub.

yes, we are all as one now.

yes, we have something we can all talk about

and we can talk about it

together.

yes, we should all call our friends

to be sure they’re safe.

(I can only wonder,

will some say they were copulating when

it happened?

will others have been sitting on the

toilet?

so many people may have been copulating

or sitting on the toilet!)

the announcer continues:

what’s that, caller?

you say you were copulating on the toilet

when it happened?

this is no time to be funny!

now we will switch to our Eye in the

Sky.

Henderson?

Henderson, are you there?

Henderson?

very well, ladies and gentlemen, we seem to have

lost contact with Henderson

so we’ll go to our roving reporter who is now

on the scene.

Barbara, are you there?

my Mexican buddy

I liked him

he was clever and he could make me laugh

and often when he worked the case next to

mine we would stick our letters together and

talk

even though it was against the

rules.

he had become an American citizen

had found his way into the post office

and owned a movie theatre in

Mexico City.

I usually disliked ambitious fellows

but this guy was humorous so I forgave

him his ambition.

“hey, man,” he asked me one night,

“how long has it been since you had

a piece of ass?”

“god, I don’t know, man, 10 years

I guess.”

“10 years? how old are you?”

“50.”

“well, listen, I’ve been shacked with this

crazy woman, you know, and I’ve told her all

about you and I thought I might send her

over to your place some night, she could cook

you dinner or something. how about it?”

“please do not project your troubles

upon me,” I told him.

“I didn’t think it would work,”

he said with a grin.

the supervisor walked up behind us and

stood there.

“listen, I’ve warned you guys about

talking!”

“about talking when?” I asked.

“listen,” he said, “just keep it up and I’ll

fry your ass!”

“you win,” I said.

the supervisor walked away.

interesting things like that happened there

almost every night!

strangers at the racetrack

I do not want to meet

them or

their wife

or look at

photographs of

their

children.

this is

serious business

this is

war

all

the

time.

I look into

their

maledict

eyes,

excuse myself

and walk

away.

and as

Rome burns and as

the odds

flash on the

tote board

Lady Luck

smiles,

crosses

her

legs

and

applauds

my

grit.

will you tiptoe through the tulips with me?

the sky is broken like a wet sack of

offal.

the air stinks, I walk into a building,

wait for the elevator, it arrives, I get in and

join 3 people with new shoes and

dead eyes.

we rise toward the tenth floor.

one of the people is a big woman

with long brown hair.

she begins to hum a little song.

I hate it.

I press the button and get off the

elevator 2 floors

early.

I wait for the next elevator.

it arrives.

it’s empty.

it’s a beautiful elevator.

I go up two floors, get out and

walk down the hall looking for

room 1002.

I find it.

I go in.

I tell the receptionist that I have a

2 o’clock appointment.

she tells me to be seated, that

they will be with me

soon.

I sit down.

there is only one other person in

the waiting room.

it is the big woman who was humming

the little song on the

elevator.

now she is silent.

she wears a green dress and

pretends to read a

magazine.

I look at her legs.

not good legs.

I get up and walk out, walk down

the hall.

I find a water fountain,

bend over, drink some

water.

then I walk back to

1002.

the woman in the green

dress is gone

but where she was

sitting on that chair

there is her green dress,

nicely folded, her shoes

and her panty

hose.

her purse is gone.

the receptionist slides

back the glass partition

and smiles at me:

“we’ll be with you

soon!”

as she slides the

partition closed

I get up and walk out of there,

fast.

I take the elevator down.

soon I am at the first floor and

then I am outside on the

street.

as I walk away from the

building I look back.

flames are rising from

the windows of the tenth

floor and spreading up.

nobody on the street seems

to notice.

I decide to have lunch.

I look for a place to eat.

I walk along humming the

same little song that the big

woman hummed.

it’s now about 95 degrees on a hot

Wednesday afternoon in

August

exactly one

year from

yesterday.

the novel life

one night I started

shivering, I got ice cold, I shivered and

shook for 2 and one half hours, the whole

bed jumped, it was like an

earthquake.

“you’re panicking,” said my girl. “breathe deeply

and try to relax.”

“I’m not panicking,” I said. “death doesn’t

mean shit to me. this is coming from some

place that I don’t understand.”

all during the freezing and shaking,

my only thought was, well, I’ve written my 5th

novel but I haven’t made the final revisions yet.

it’s not fair that I die

now.

then I got well and revised my 5th novel and

it’s supposed to be out next spring, so you

know I won’t die, be killed, or catch a fatal

disease until then.

even in midlife I never

dreamed I’d write a novel

and here I’ve written 5, it’s a bloody

miracle, a shout from the heart,

far from the school yards of hell

which started the luck

and far from

the world of hell that followed and

which kept it

going.

thanks for your help

here

there’s less and less reason to write as they all close in.

I’ve barricaded the doors and windows, have bottled water, canned

food, candles, tools, rope, bandages, toothpicks, catnip,

mousetraps, reading material, toilet paper, blankets, firearms,

mirrors, knives

—cigarettes, cigars, candy—

memories, regrets, my birth certificate,

photographs of

picnics

parades

invasions;

I have roach spray, fine French wine, paper clips and last year’s

calendar because

THIS COULD BE MY LAST POEM.

it could happen and, of course, I’ve considered and

reconsidered

death

but I haven’t yet come up with how, which makes me feel

rather foolish about everything,

especially now.

—just waiting is the worst.

nothing worse than waiting

just waiting. always hated to

wait. what’s there about waiting that’s so

intolerable?

—like you’re waiting for me to finish this

poem and

I don’t know exactly

how

so I won’t.

—so, if you happen to read this

in a magazine or a book

just

rip the page out

tear it up

and that’s the graceful way

to end this poem

once and for

all.

I have continued regardless

almost ever since I began writing

decades ago

I have been dogged by

whisperers and gossips

who have proclaimed

daily

weekly

yearly

that

I can’t write anymore

that now

I slip

and fall.

when I first began

there was much complaining about

the content of my

poems and stories.

“who cares about the low life of a

drunken bum?

is that all he can write about,

whores and puking?”

and now

their complaint is:

“who cares about the life of a

rich

bum?

why doesn’t he write about whores

and puking

anymore?”

the Academics consider me

too raw

and I haven’t consorted with most of the

others.

the few people I know well have nothing to do

with poetry.

there has also been envy-hatred

on the part of

some fellow writers

but I consider this

one of my finest

accomplishments.

when I first began this dangerous

game

I predicted that these

very things would

occur.

let them all rail:

if it wasn’t me,

it would just be someone

else.

these

gossips and complainers,

what have they accomplished

anyway?

never having risen

they

can neither

slip nor

fall.

balloons

I saw too many faces today

faces like balloons.

at times I felt like

lifting the skin

and asking,

“anybody under there?”

there are medical terms for

fear of height

for

fear of

enclosed spaces.

there are medical terms for

any number of

maladies

so

there must be a medical term

for:

“too many people.”

I’ve been stricken with

this malady

all my life:

there has always been

“too many people.”

I saw too many faces

today, hundreds of

them

with eyes, ears, lips,

mouths, chins and so

forth

and

I’ve been alone

for several hours

now

and

I feel that I am

recovering.

which is the good part

but the problem

remains

that I know I’m going to

have to go out there

among them

again.

moving toward the dark

if we can’t find the courage to go on,

what will we do?

what should we do?

what would you do?

if we can’t find the courage to go on,

then

what day

what minute

in what year

did we go

wrong?

or was it an accumulation of all the

years?

I have some answers.

to die, yes.

to go mad, maybe.

or perhaps to

gamble everything away?

if we can’t find the courage to go on,

what should we do?

what did all the others

do?

they went on

living their lives,

badly.

we’ll do the same,

probably.

living too long

takes more than

time.

the real thing

yes, I know that you think

I am wrong

but

I know what is right for me

and what

is not.

may I tell you my

dream?

I am surrounded by

thick cement walls,

I am dressed in a red

robe

and I am sitting at an

organ.

there is

not a

sound.

I begin to play the

organ.

the hiss of the notes

is sharp and soft

at the same

time.

it is a slightly bitter

music

but among the dark notes

there are flashes of light and

laughter.

as I play,

the incomprehensible mystery

of the past

and of the present

becomes

comprehensible.

and best of all,

as I play,

nobody hears the music

but me.

the music is only for

me.

that is my

dream.

she looked at me and asked,

did you?

did you?

did you?

on the cuff

Jane would awaken early

(and 8:30 a.m. is early

when you go to bed at

dawn).

she would awaken crying and bitching

for a drink.

she’d keep at it, bitching and wailing,

just laying there flat on her back

and running all that noise

through my

hangover.

until finally, I’d leap out of bed

landing hard on my feet. “ALL RIGHT,

ALL RIGHT, GOD DAMN IT, SHUT UP!”

and I’d climb into the same pants, the

same shirt, the same dirty socks, I was

unshaven, unbrushed, young and mad—

mad, yes, to be shacked with a woman

ten years older than

I.

no job, behind in the rent, the same tired old

script.

down three flights of stairs and out

the back way

(the apartment house manager hung out

by the front entrance,

Mr. Notes-under-the-door, Mr.

Cop-caller, Mr. Listen-we-have-only-nice-

tenants-here).

then down the hill to the liquor

store around the corner, old Don Kaufman

who wired all the bottles

to the counter, even the cheap

stuff.

and Don would see me coming, “no, no,

not today!”

he meant no booze without

cash, I was into him pretty deep

but each time I looked at all

those bottles

I got angry because

he didn’t need all those

bottles.

“Don, I want 3 bottles of cheap

wine.”

“oh no, Hank.”

he was an old man, I terrorized

him and part of me felt bad

doing it.

the old fart should have

blown me away

with his handgun.

“Hank, you used to be such a nice

man, such a gentleman.

what’s happened?”

“look, Don, I don’t want a character

analysis, I want 3 bottles of cheap

wine.”

“when are you going to pay?”

“Don, I’m going to get an income tax

refund any day

now.”

“I can’t let you have anything,

Hank.”

then I’d take hold of the counter

and begin rocking it, ripping at it,

the bottles rattling, joints and seams

giving way

all the while

cussing my ass

off.

“all right, Hank, all

right!”

then

back up the hill, back through

the rear entrance, up the three

flights of stairs

and there she’d be, still in bed.

she was getting fatter and

fatter, although we seldom

ate.

“3 bottles,” I said, “of

port.”

“thank god!”

“no, thank me. I work the

miracles around

here.”

then

I’d pour the port into

two tall water

glasses

another day

begun.

alone again

I think of each of

them

living somewhere else

sitting somewhere else

standing somewhere else

sleeping somewhere else

or maybe feeding a

child

or

reading a

newspaper or screaming

at their

new man …

but thankfully

my female past

(for me)

has concluded

peacefully.

yet most others seem to

believe that a

new relationship will certainly

work.

that the last one

was simply the

error of

choosing a bad

mate.

just

bad taste

bad luck

bad fate.

and then there are some who

believe that old

relationships can be

revived and made new

again.

but please

if you feel that way

don’t phone

don’t write

don’t arrive

and meanwhile,

don’t

feel bruised because this

poem will last much

longer than we

did.

it deserves to:

you see

its strength is

that it seeks

no

mate at

all.

fooling Marie (the poem)

he met her at the racetrack, a strawberry

blonde with round hips, well-bosomed, long legs,

turned-up nose, flower mouth, in a pink dress,

wearing white high-heeled shoes.

she began asking him questions about various

horses while looking up at him with her pale blue

eyes.

he suggested the bar and they had a drink, then

watched the next race together.

he hit fifty-win on a sixty-to-one shot and she

jumped up and down.

then she whispered in his ear,

“you’re the magic man! I want to fuck you!”

he grinned and said, “I’d like to, but

Marie … my wife …”

she laughed, “we’ll go to a motel!”

so they cashed the ticket, went to the parking lot,

got into her car. “I’ll drive you back when

we’re finished,” she smiled.

they found a motel about a mile

west. she parked, they got out, checked in, went to

room 302.

they had stopped for a bottle of Jack Daniel’s

on the way. he stood and took the glasses out of the

cellophane. as she undressed he poured two.

she had a marvelous young body. she sat on the edge of

the bed sipping at the Jack Daniel’s as he

undressed. he felt awkward, fat and old

but knew he was lucky: it promised to be his best day

ever.

then he too sat on the edge of the bed with her and

his Jack Daniel’s. she reached over

and grabbed him between the legs, bent over

and went down on him.

he pulled her under the covers and they played some more.

finally, he mounted her and it was great, it was a

miracle, but soon it ended, and when she

went to the bathroom he poured two more drinks

thinking, I’ll shower real good, Marie will never

know.

she came out and they sat in bed

making small talk.

“I’m going to shower now,” he told her,

“I’ll be out soon.”

“o.k., cutie,” she said.

he soaped good in the shower, washing away all the

perfume, the woman-smell.

“hurry up, daddy!” he heard her say.

“I won’t be long, baby!” he yelled from the

shower.

he got out, toweled off, then opened the bathroom

door and stepped out.

the motel room was empty.

she was gone.

on some impulse he ran to the closet, pulled the door

open: nothing there but coat hangers.

then he noticed that his clothes were gone, his underwear,

his shirt, his pants with the car keys and his wallet,

all the money, his shoes, his stockings, everything.

on another impulse he looked under the bed.

nothing.

then he saw the bottle of Jack Daniel’s, half full,

standing on the dresser.

he walked over and poured a drink.

as he did he saw the word scrawled on the dresser

mirror in pink lipstick: SUCKER.

he drank the whiskey, put the glass down and watched himself

in the mirror, very fat, very tired, very old.

he had no idea what to do next.

he carried the whiskey back to the bed, sat down,

lifted the bottle and sucked at it as the light from the

boulevard came in through the dusty blinds. then he just sat

and looked out and watched the cars, passing back and

forth.

the copulation blues

fuck

the phone rings once

stops

fuck

I am on top

we roll off to the side

fuck

she throws one leg over

and plays with her clit

while I harpoon her

fuck

the dog scratches on the door

won’t stop

I get up and let him in

then it’s time to

suck

she’s got it in her mouth

not the dog

me

suck suck

the doorbell rings

a man selling mops made by the blind

we buy a mop for eleven dollars with a little gadget

that squeezes out the water

fuck

now it’s up again

I’m on top again

the phone rings

a girlfriend of hers from Stockton

they talk for ten minutes

finish

I am reading the sports section when

she comes back with a bowl of grapes and

I hand her the woman’s page

no fuck.

the faithful wife

she was a married woman

and she wrote sad

and futile poems

about her married life.

her many letters to me

were the same: sad

and repetitive and

futile.

we exchanged letters for

some years.

I was depressed and suicidal

and had had nothing but

bad luck

with women

so I continued to write

her

thinking, well, maybe

this way

no ill will come to

either one of us.

but

one night suddenly

she was in town, she

phoned me:

“I’m at a meeting of

The Chaparral Poets of

California!”

“o.k.,” I said, “good

luck.”

“I mean,” she asked,

“don’t you want to

see me?”

“oh, yeah …”

she told me she would be

waiting at a certain bar

in Pasadena.

I had half a glass of

whiskey, 2 cans of beer

and

set out.

I found the bar, went

in.

there she was (she had

sent photos) the little

housewife giddy on

martinis.

I sat down beside

her.

“oh my god,” she said, “it’s you!

I just can’t believe it!”

I ordered a couple of drinks from

the barkeep.

she kissed me right there, tongue

and all.

we had a couple more drinks

then got into my car

and with her

holding my cock

I drove the freeway

back to my place

where I sat her down.

she began talking about

poetry

but I got her back

into the bedroom

got her down onto the bed

and stripped down

except for the

panties.

I had never seen

such a

beautiful body.

I began to slip the

panties off but she

said, “no, no, I can TELL

you’re very POTENT, you’ll make

me PREGNANT!”

“well,” I said, “what the hell!”

I rolled over then and went to

sleep.

the next morning

I drove her back to her

Chaparral Poets of

California.

as the weeks and months

went on

her letters kept arriving.

I answered some, then

stopped.

but her letters kept coming.

there wasn’t much news

but many photos: photos of

her children, photos of her,

there was one photo of her

sitting alone on a rock

by the seashore.

then the letters were fewer and

fewer and then they stopped.

add some years

some other women

many changes of address

and one day

a new letter found

its way to

me:

the children were grown

and gone.

her husband had lost his

part of the business, his

partners had knifed

him,

they were going to have to

sell the house.

I answered that

letter.

two or three weeks

passed.

her next letter said

that there was a divorce and

it was final.

she enclosed a photo.

I didn’t know who it

was at first.

182 pounds. she said

she’d been living on

submarine sandwiches and

refried beans and was

looking for a job.

never had a job.

she could only type

23 w.p.m.

she enclosed a small

chapbook of her poems

inscribed “Love.”

I should have fucked her that

long-ago night.

I should have been a

dog.

it would have been one good

night for each of us, especially

for me

stuck between suicide and

insanity

in bed with the beautiful

housewife.

I had never seen a body like

hers before.

now I don’t even have

her letters.

there are nearly a hundred

of them

somewhere

and this is

a sad futile poem

about it

all.

once in a while

it is only

once in a while

that you see

someone whose

electricity

and presence

matches yours

at that

moment

and then

usually it’s

a stranger.

it was 3 or 4

years ago

I was walking on

Sunset Boulevard

toward Vermont

when

a block away

I noticed a

figure moving

toward me.

there was something

in her carriage

and in her walk

which

attracted

me.

as we came

closer

the intensity

increased.

suddenly

I knew her

entire history:

she had lived

all her life

with men

who had never really

known her.

as she approached

I became almost

dizzy.

I could hear her

footsteps as

she approached.

I looked into

her face.

she was as

beautiful

as I had

imagined she

would be.

as we passed

our eyes fucked

and loved and

sang to each

other

and then

she moved

past me.

I walked on

not looking

back.

then

when I looked

back

she was

gone.

what is one

to do

in a world

where almost everything

worth having

or doing

is

impossible?

I went into

a coffee shop

and decided that

if I ever saw

her again somehow

I’d say,

“listen, please,

I just must

speak to

you …”

I never saw her

again

I never will.

the iron in our

society silences

a man’s

heart

and when you

silence a man’s

heart

you leave him

finally

with only

a cock.

another high-roller

I went to Vegas last weekend

I had on that blue dress

low-cut and short

the one you like

and I wore my brown boots

and this guy at the crap table

he kept winning

and he kept feeding me chips

he said I brought him luck.

I won a few hundred but

I swear to Christ he must have

won 40 thousand dollars that

night.

he was a great guy.

he told me,

“don’t go away, we’re going to win

the world! ”

it was some night, believe me.

I’ll never forget it.

you don’t like Vegas, do

you? she asked.

I once got married there,

I said.

and what did you do over the

weekend? she asked.

I waxed my car,

I told her.

the fucking horses

“the fucking horses,” she said, “you keep bringing me

out to these fucking horse races and I lose, god damn it,

it’s all so useless and ignorant, I hate it, I just

hate it!”

her purse had a long strap and she was swinging it

around and around with great velocity.

we were walking out of the track after the

last race.

“I told you,” I said, “not to bet the horses with

high speed ratings, especially at comparative

distances.”

“but shit,” she screamed, “why doesn’t it work?

the horse that ran faster last time, why doesn’t

he win against the slower ones?”

“anybody can take a short price on exposed form,”

I said. “it’s self-defeating.”

“goddamn you!” she screamed. “I hate you and I hate horses!”

and she swung her purse around and around on its

long strap.

then there was a hard harsh thud:

she had just hit the man on the head

who was walking behind us.

the poor soul was badly staggered.

an elderly Mexican.

I held him up by the arm.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I said,

“it was an accident!

she didn’t mean to hit you with her

purse!

she has lost a great deal of money today

and she’s a little crazy!

I’m very sorry!”

“it’s all right,” the fellow said.

I let go of his arm and we turned and

walked on.

“what’s the matter?” she screamed.

“are you afraid of that man?

are you afraid of a real fight?”

“of course I am,” I told her.

“I thought so!” she screamed. “let’s

get the hell out of here!”

it was when we got to the car

and after I got it started that

this thought

went through my mind:

baby, I don’t know why the hell

I’m living with you!

I stopped at the first light.

then as we drove up Huntington Drive

she said to me,

“you know, I don’t know why the hell

I’m living with you!”

I kept on driving up Huntington.

then I turned on the car radio.

we had been together one and one-half

years.

it’s always easier to meet than

to part.

I know

because after that day at the track

we managed to live together for another

year.

hello there!

when death comes with its last cold kiss

I’ll be ready.

(I’ve already experienced my share of

deathly

kisses.)

the mad ladies who helped me

consume my hours

my years

have readied me for the

dark.

when death comes with its last cold kiss

I’ll be ready:

just another whore

come to

shake me

down.

the fuck-master

Arnie was ahead of all of us, he began shaving

first and then he flashed rubbers at us

in their mysterious tin cases

and he was the first one with his own automobile

and he always had some girl in his

car, always a new one,

sitting there quiet and frightened

and we knew he was fucking her

and

he knew where to get gin, he’d get them

drunk on gin and then he’d do it to

them!

all that was in jr. high

but when we went on to

high school

Arnie kept going back to jr. high

to pick up the jr. high school girls

in his car (it was almost like he was stuck

back there in jr.

high).

well, time passed and then Arnie

dropped out of high school and

I forgot about

him.

two years later I was walking

home after classes one afternoon

and here came

Arnie.

Christ, he looked all wizened, almost

vanished.

I had gotten bigger and wiser meanwhile

and I was more comfortable with

things.

I slapped him on the back, “hey, Arnie, you

FUCKER, how ya

doin’?”

“hi, Hank,” he

said.

we shook hands and his hand was trembling

and sweaty.

I let go of

it.

we stood and looked at each other.

“well, see you around, cousin,” I

said.

and I

left him standing there.

the poor guy had fucked himself away, completely

fucked himself

away.

and I still had all mine

left!

my personal psychologist

you’re a screwed-up Romantic, she said,

you read all the old philosophers and you

listen to Wagner and Mahler and you think

the ancient Chinese poets were hot shit, yet

you’re depraved, you’re at the racetrack

every day and you know that’s sick, and

all that wine you drink, it’s eating

your brain away, and when you get drunk

you talk about what a great fighter you

used to be, even though you admit you

took more beatings than you gave.

you dislike people and love animals.

I really don’t know what the hell you’re

all about—you just grab at things, you rely

solely on instinct and your prejudices

and sometimes I think you’re retarded.

it was your childhood, you didn’t get any

love so it’s hard for you to give any,

you just get drunk and call every woman a

whore.

listen, I said, isn’t there any more

beer?

and where the hell are the cigarettes?

there were 3 on this table a moment ago and

now they’re all

gone!

jealousy

I know this fellow, he is

amazing, so terribly

dull

but get him in a room full of

women

and he will find the easy

one

and they will begin

talking

and eventually they will

vanish

and they will

fuck.

his conversation is quite

banal:

“oh, did your mother

come from Michigan? I had a

brother who went to the

University of Detroit!”

what all this means is

that he will talk and talk

about anything and listen and

listen forever to

everything.

the ladies really

ate

it

up.

most of us are

unable to accomplish

this kind of thing

but this fellow

can talk

dumb crap for hours

and much later

after completing his

coitus

he will walk in

with the smiling lady

like a Lion King

as if the

whole thing

was

an endearing adventure

and somehow

fulfilling

for us

all.

her guy

you had gotten out of

jail earlier that morning.

you got home about 4:30 a.m.

and started drinking with those

two dykes.

when I got there around 9 a.m.

you were lying on the couch with them

in your shorts and

undershirt

smoking an old cigar

and holding a beer can in your

hand,

you were a mess,

you had pennies and beer caps

stuck to your back

and the floor was covered with

bottles.

“hi, kid,” you said,

“I just got out … we’re celebrating.”

you were totally gone.

I’d heard some terrible things about you

and finally

I believed them.

dead poet’s wife

she told me that I was insensitive

that I didn’t revere God or love

animals. even flies have souls,

she told me.

we were in a motel room at Laguna

Beach. she was overweight and

so was I and maybe in the

great all-encompassing nature of things

we both had souls

like flies.

I lifted my drink

and emptied it.

“shit,” she said, “William drank too much

too. don’t you know that life can be

beautiful?”

“yes, that’s why I drink.”

“don’t you love the beauty of nature?” she

asked. “don’t you ever think of the miracle

of birth?”

“I think of the miracle of death.”

“I used to think you were a great poet,”

she said, “but now that I’ve met you and

know you better, I don’t think that anymore.

you can’t fuck

me.”

“I don’t have the desire to fuck

you,” I answered, “and you know it.”

it was 3 a.m. and I walked out of the

motel room with a new drink in my hand.

I was dressed in my shorts and I

finished the drink and dropped myself

into the swimming pool. all the lights

were out. the manager stepped out as

I dog-paddled about in the dark.

“what the hell are you doing?” he

screamed.

“turn on the pool lights,” I screamed back.

the lights came on and I paddled around for

5 minutes more, then climbed out and walked

back into the motel room.

she had her back turned to me in the bed.

I got in with a new drink and looked at

my feet sticking out from under the covers.

I decided that I had the most beautiful feet

of any man on earth.

then the pool lights went out and all I

could see was the glowing end of my cigarette.

I decided that in the great all-encompassing

nature of things it must certainly have

a soul too.

scrambled legs

we were having lunch

at Hal’s Diner.

“you know,” he told me, “after we made love

the last time

she lay in my arms and cried. she said,

‘oh my god, I miss him so!’

she was talking about you, Hank.”

“that’s just the way it is, Jack, with all

my women: while I’m with them they hate

me but after I leave them they love

me.

I’m never tempted to go back to them, however, I don’t even

consider it.”

“you don’t mind that I slept with her,

Hank?”

“did she cook you a good breakfast afterwards,

Jack?”

“I don’t remember.”

“well, I’ll tell you: she didn’t.”

“is that the reason you left her:

because she couldn’t cook

a good breakfast?”

“I never eat breakfast, Jack.”

“then what happened?”

“too often, after we made love, she

began crying in my arms about how she

missed some other guy.”

“well,” he said, “I’ll be a son-of-a-bitch.”

“don’t be,” I said, “just pass the salt and

pepper.”

endless love

I’ve seen old married couples

sitting in their rockers

across from one another

being congratulated

for staying together 60 or 70

years,

either of whom

would

long ago have

settled for something

else, anything else,

but fate

fear and

circumstances have

bound them

eternally together;

and as we tell them

how wonderful

their great and enduring love

is

only they

really know

the truth

but they don’t tell us

that from the first day they

met

somehow

it didn’t mean

all that much:

like

waiting for death

now

it was just an endless determination to

endure.

down and out on the boardwalk

she lived in Venice

on some 2nd floor

and I’d knock and she’d

let me in

and there was no bed

just a mat on the floor

and candles

everywhere

there was even a

piano

and there was also a

guitar

and while we sipped

white wine

she’d sit on the

floor

and play the

guitar

and sing songs

her own lyrics

godawful stuff

about the

soul

and I’d go to the

window

and look out and

say

“nice view but let’s

work out.”

“work out?”

she’d ask. “what

do you mean?”

“I mean

I’ll suck your tits

and stuff.”

“I want you to hear

this new

song.”

she’d start right

in.

she had an awful

voice but

nice long

hair.

I’d get playful

and hammer on the

piano

just so I wouldn’t

have to listen

to

her.

I was in a bad

way: in between

real women

and just

doing time

with

her.

one night I

asked her,

“listen, how do you

make it?”

“make it?”

“I mean

how do you pay the

rent, all

that?”

“oh, I’m a marriage

counselor.”

“really?”

“yes.”

“you been married?”

“3 times.”

I finally stopped going

to her

place

but somehow

she found out where

I lived

and then came

to see

me.

she said we couldn’t have

sex

because she was going to

be married again

and didn’t want to be

untrue

to him.

she described

her boyfriend

in detail

to me

then took out her

guitar

and started

singing.

later that night

I sodomized her

and told her

not to

come

around any

more.

I got lucky:

she

didn’t.

soon after that

I met a plump

Jewish girl

who promised

she’d

save me from

myself.

I thought

that would be

a very good

idea.

sex sister

there were 4 of them between the ages of 30 and 45 and

all they talked about was men and sex, I mean,

it was all-consuming, to them there wasn’t anything

else.

I was living with the youngest sister and she had me

performing sexual acts I had never even heard of

before.

“now, let’s try this.”

“all right.”

at first it was lively, adventurous, even

humorous

but

as the months passed and the nights added up I

began to resent it, like—oh, here we go with SEX

again!

(she also liked to do it in strange places like public

parks or in automobiles while I was driving.)

I began to feel that all the sisters were crazy; in fact,

one of them had been in a madhouse (the one I was with).

the sisters had boisterous, screeching laughs, really

rather ugly laughs

and I began drinking more so I could tolerate

them and their laughter.

the drinking made the sister I was with quite angry

because sometimes I would just go to sleep

instead of performing.

I finally told my lady that I couldn’t take it anymore

and that it was over and she seemed to accept that at first

but finally it was not to be so:

she began to phone me continually, mostly at night,

around 3 or 4 a.m.: “YOU’VE GOT SOMEBODY THERE,

HAVEN’T YOU?”

she followed me everywhere. once I took some clothes in

to the cleaners and when I came out my car was nearly

destroyed—ripped upholstery, shattered windows, torn

dashboard, all within 3 or 4 minutes.

it looked as if a tiger had been in the car.

another time I was making love to another lady when my

bedroom window was

smashed open and there was the sister’s face, twisted, spitting

at me, “YOU FUCKING BASTARD!” then she was

gone.

the lady in bed was terrified, trembling. “what was

that?”

“nothing, baby, nothing.”

the sex sister also tried to murder me a couple of times in a couple

of different ways and just missed both

times.

let me tell you that the police weren’t much

help, they picked her up but she somehow convinced

them that I was at fault.

“there’s nothing wrong with that lady,” they told me,

both times.

two squads of officers.

maybe she had sex with the whole gang of

them?

fortunately, as the months went on she gradually abandoned her

terrorist attacks until finally it was just a weepy

phone call or two and then a letter or two, then

silence.

she probably found somebody who could perform all the tricks that

she had taught me and could probably perform them

better. I hope

so.

and I just hope he likes sex

62 times a

month.

to the ladies no longer here

it’s just as well

you should see me now

driving to the racetrack

a tiny German flag decorating the rear

window.

I dislike the heavy traffic on the

boulevard and

I drive through the back streets of the black

ghetto.

the years have gone by

quickly.

Death sits in the seat next to

me.

we make a lovely

couple.

a man finds consolation while driving

and waiting.

one consolation is

how lucky I am

that I never settled down permanently

with any one of the

ladies.

driving along, that thought comes back to

me and falls at my feet.

Death picks it up

looks at me

shudders

and quickly fastens his

seat belt.

the nude dancer

she’s got a 6- month-old baby

and a 9- year-old

son,

but

she said

it sure beats the factories.

why do those guys just sit there and

stare at that thing

when a woman’s dancing? I

asked.

they memorize it, she said, then they

go home and flog off. I danced last

night and nobody watched me.

they were all watching some movie

where this woman was fingering

herself, and

after I finished my dance

I stood there and told them,

you guys are going to go crazy watching that

shit. you don’t know where you’re at

anymore.

you know, some of those guys freaked

out? about 7 of them got up and

left.

no shit, I said.

no shit, she said. I’ve worked 3 different places

since I’ve seen you

last. but it beats the factories and

it beats the

streets.

at least you can catch a drink

once in a while.

yes, that’s right,

I told her,

that’s right.

Ma Barker loves me

lying in the sack in the dark

sick from days of drinking.

head hurting

tongue thick.

watching tv

phone off the hook.

tired of trying to relate to the

female,

I watch tv.

the walls stacked up around me

like shields.

I watch these guys blasting holes

in people

with their submachineguns.

they need money

they have trouble with their molls

things keep

screwing up.

I get up to piss during a tire

commercial.

when I get back the main guy is

lying out in a field with his

moll.

there’s a stream below them.

it’s peaceful but he has a cigar

stuck into his mouth and a .357 magnum

resting in his shoulder holster.

the moll leans over him

she has blonde wispy hair which flicks

in the wind.

she says, “Johnny, why don’t you give

it up?”

“give what up?” he asks.

“you know, Johnny,” she says, “killing

people and all that …”

“now, baby,” he says, “I’m just trying

to get by.”

“you could give all that up, Johnny, we

could settle down in a nice little place

with a picket fence and have babies …”

“ah, now, baby, that life ain’t for

me.”

“well, Johnny,” she smiles, “it’s either

give it up or lose me …”

he sits up

pushes her away:

“no, baby! you don’t mean that?”

“yes,” she says, “I do , Johnny!”

“I’m not going to live without you,

baby,” he says

takes out the .357

jams it between her legs and

pulls the trigger.

I get up

go to the refrigerator and

get a beer.

when I come back

there’s a shaving cream commercial

on.

I drain the beer

toss it in the basket

put the phone back on the hook

dial a number.

she answers and I say, “listen,

baby, I can’t have you around

anymore, you

get in the way.

sorry.”

I hang up

take the phone back

off the hook.

time for another beer.

I like gangster movies

best.

here we go again

it’s stupid, I know, but I have an

ability to feel happy for little or no reason,

it’s not a great elation, it’s

more like a steady

warmth—

something like a warm heater on a cold

night.

I have no religion, and not even a

decent philosophy

and I’m not

stupid: I know that death will finally

arrive

but don’t consider even this to be

a negative

factor.

which is to say that in spite of

everything, I feel good

most of the

time.

I appear to handle setbacks, bad

luck, minor tragedies, without

difficulty, my mood remains

unchanged.

much experience, perhaps, has taught

me

how to remain unmoved.

yet there is one situation

I can’t endure:

a bitter, depressed, angry

woman

can still murder any

good feelings

that I might have—and

just like that I despair and

fall into a black

pit.

this occurs with some

regularity and unfortunately

in the wink of an

eye I am sullen and

depressed.

and that’s stupid,

I should be able to ignore

female

disorders

even as the dark shit

(that despite the dark shit)

floods my

brain.

do you believe that a man can be taught to write?

there was my cheap hotel; I was up on the 4th floor; I’d

bring a lady in from the bar 2 or 3 times a week and we’d burst into that

lobby like we wanted to wreck something, and the desk clerk, a really

nice fellow, was terrified of me, I was big of chest and gut and when

the writing was going badly, which it often was, upon

entering with my lady, I’d take it out on the desk clerk: “hey,

buddy, I think I’ll take one of your legs, twist it up the middle

of your back and wind you like a clock!”

I had him so scared he only called the cops once or twice and I

had fun with the cops—barricading the door and listening to the dumb

useless double-talk that cops liked to use; I always wore them

down and they never got in.

up there I stripped to my undershirt and shorts, I was nuts,

had very muscular legs, strutted up and down the room saying, “look at

my legs, baby! you ever seen legs like that?”

I always pretended to be the toughest guy in town but

when it actually came to fighting I wasn’t all that good: I

could take a hell of a punch and didn’t have much fear but my own left

hook and right cross were missing, and worse, I couldn’t seem to

get the hatred going, it all seemed a joke to me, even when some guy was

crushing my head against the edge of some urinal.

but let’s forget all that! up on that 4th floor, I was best, the red neon

sign near the downtown library flashing CHRIST SAVES, me

strutting about and proclaiming, “nobody knows I’m a genius but

me!”

and all the time I was strutting I would glance over at my lady of

the night, looking at those legs, those high heels, thinking, I’m going

to rip the love out of those high-heeled shoes and those ankles and those

thighs and that dumb pitiful face, I’m going to make her come alive!

and poor Hemingway, I thought, never met dolls like I’ve met

dolls!

which was true.

he would have walked away.

hail and farewell

as gentle as a butterfly

fluttering in the

murdered light

you came through here

like fire singing

and when it was over

the walls came down

the flags went up

and love was finished.

you left behind a pair of shoes

an old purse

and some birthday and

Xmas cards

from me all

held together

by a green rubber

band.

all well and good enough,

I suppose,

because

when your lover is gone,

thank the gods,

the silence is

final.

weep

weep for the indifference of flying fish

weep for the absence of long-haired blondes

weep for the sadness of yourself

weep for Bach

weep for the extinct animals

weep for grandfather’s clock

weep for weeping

because no one cares

the doors open in and out

the lights go on and off

teeth are pulled

I forgive the indifference of flying fish

I forgive the butterfly and the moth

I forgive the first woman who held my psyche

in her fingertips when

I was sold into captivity

long ago.

it’s a lonely world

of frightened people.

a note upon modern poesy

poetry has come a long way, though very slowly;

you aren’t as old as I am

and I can remember reading

magazines where at the end of a poem

it said:

Paris, 1928.

that seemed to make a

difference, and so, those who could afford to

(and some who couldn’t)

went to

PARIS

and wrote.

I am also old enough so that I remember when poems

made many references to the Greek and Roman

gods.

if you didn’t know your gods you weren’t a very good

writer.

also, if you couldn’t slip in a line of

Spanish, French or

Italian,

you certainly weren’t a very good

writer.

5 or 6 decades ago,

maybe 7,

some poets started using

“i” for “I”

or

“&” for “and.”

many still use a small

“i” and many more continue to use the

“&”

feeling that this is

poetically quite effective and

up-to-date.

also, the oldest notion still in vogue is

that if you can’t understand a poem then

it almost certainly is a

good one.

poetry is still moving slowly forward, I guess,

and when your average garage mechanics

start bringing books of poesy to read

on their lunch breaks

then we’ll know for sure we’re moving in

the right

direction.

&

of this

i

am sure.

the end of an era

he lived in the Village

in New York

in the old days

and only after he died

did he get a write-up

in a snob magazine,

a magazine which had

never printed his

poems.

he came from the days

when poets called

themselves

Bohemians.

he wore a beret and a

scarf

and hung around the

cafés,

bummed drinks,

sometimes got a

night’s lodging from the

rich

(just for

laughs)

but mostly

he slept in the alleys

at night.

the whores knew him

well

and gave him

little

hand-outs.

he was a communist

or a

socialist

depending upon what

he was

reading

at that

moment.

it was 1939

and he had a

burning hatred

in his heart

for the

Nazis.

when he

recited his poems

in the street

he always

ended up

frothing about the

Nazis.

he passed out

little stapled

pages

of his

poems

and

he wrote

with a

simple

intensity.

he was good

but not

great.

and even the good poems

were not

that

good.

anyhow

he was an

attraction;

the tourists always

asked for

him.

he was always

in love

with some

new whore.

he had a

real

soul

and the usual

real

needs.

he stank

and wore cast-off clothes

and he screamed

when he spoke

but

at least

he wasn’t anybody

but

himself.

the Village was

his

Paris.

but unlike

Henry Miller

who made

failure

glorious

and finally

lucrative

he didn’t know

quite how

to accomplish

that.

instead of being

a

genius-freak

he was just

a

freak-freak.

but most of

the writers and

painters

who also had failed

loved him

because he

symbolized

for them

the possibility

of being

recognized.

they too wore

scarves and

berets

and did more

complaining than

creating.

but then they

lost him.

he was found

one morning

in an

alley

wrapped around

his latest

whore.

both of them

had their

throats

cut

wide.

and

on the wall

above them

in their

blood

were scrawled

the words:

“COMMIE PIG!”

another freak

had found

him?

a

freak- Nazi?

or maybe

just a

freak-freak?

but his

murder

finally created

the fame

he had always

wanted,

though it was

to be but

temporary.

he was to

have a

final

fling

in this

his

crazy

life and

death.

he had left

an envelope

with a prominent

Matron of the

Arts,

marked:

TO BE OPENED

ONLY IN THE EVENT

OF

MY DEATH.

all during his

stay in the

Village

he had spoken

about a mysterious

WORK IN

PROGRESS.

he had claimed

he’d written a

GIGANTIC WORK,

more pages than

a couple of

telephone

books.

it would

dwarf Pound’s

Cantos

and put a

headlock

on the

Bible.

the instructions

were

specific:

the WORK was

in an iron

chest

buried

in a graveyard

30 yards

south and west

of a certain tree

(indicated on a

hand-drawn

map)

the tree

where he claimed

Whitman once

rested

while he wrote

“I Celebrate Myself.”

the ground

all about was

soon

dug up and

searched.

nothing was

found.

some Romantics

claimed it was

still

there

somewhere.

Realists

claimed it never had

been there.

maybe the

Nazis

got there

first?

at any rate

it was

shortly after

that

that

almost all the

poets

in the

Village

and most poets

living

elsewhere

stopped

wearing

scarves and

berets

and reluctantly

went off to

war.

Paris in the spring

if death was staring you in the face,

he was asked, what would you say to your readers?

nothing, he told the interviewer, would you please

order another bottle of wine?

he was an old, tired writer from Los Angeles, hungover,

and his French publisher had pushed one more

interview on him.

the free dinners and drinks usually

were great

but now he was fed up.

the many recent interviews had become

frustrating and boring.

he figured either his books would sell on their own

or fail the same way.

he hadn’t written them for money anyhow but to keep

himself out of the madhouse.

he tried to tell the interviewers this but they just went on with

their usual

banal questions:

have you met Norman Mailer?

what do you think of Camus, Sartre, Céline?

do your books sell better here than in America?

did you really work in a slaughterhouse?

do you think Hemingway was homosexual?

do you take drugs?

do you drink when you write?

are you a misanthrope?

who is your favorite writer?

the interviewer ordered another bottle of wine.

it was 11:15 p.m. on the patio of a hotel.

there were little white tables and chairs scattered about.

theirs was the only one occupied.

there was the interviewer, a photographer,

the writer and his wife.

have you had sex with children? the interviewer

asked.

no, answered the writer.

in one of your stories a man has sex with a

child and you describe it very

graphically.

well? asked the writer.

it was as if you enjoyed it, the interviewer said.

I sometimes enjoy writing, the writer said.

you seemed to have experienced what you were describing,

said the interviewer.

I only photograph life, said the writer. I might write

about a murderer but this doesn’t mean that I am

one or would enjoy being one.

ah, here’s the wine, said the interviewer.

the waiter took out the cork, poured a bit for

him.

the interviewer took a taste, nodded to the

waiter

and the waiter poured all

around.

the wine goes fast when there’s four of us, said the

writer.

do you drink because you are afraid of life?

the interviewer asked.

disgusted with life is more like it, said the writer, and with

you.

we were up very early, said the writer’s wife.

he’s given at least a dozen interviews over the past

3 days and he’s tired.

I am from one of the city’s most important newspapers,

said the interviewer.

fuck you, said the writer.

what? said the interviewer. you can’t talk to me

like that!

I am, said the writer.

all you American writers think you’re God, said the

interviewer.

God is dead, said the writer, remember?

this interview is over! said the interviewer.

the photographer quickly drank his wine,

then he and the interviewer stood up

and walked out.

you better get yourself together, said the wife

to the writer, you’re on television tomorrow

night.

I’ll tell them to kiss my ass, said the writer.

you can’t do that, said his wife.

baby, said the writer, lifting his

wineglass, watch me!

you’re just a drunk who writes, said his wife.

that’s better than a drunk who just drinks,

said the writer.

his wife sighed.

well, do you want to go back to the room or to another

café?

to another café, said the writer.

they rose and walked slowly out of the

restaurant, he looking through his pocket for

cigarettes, she looking back over her shoulder

as if something was following

them.

alone in this chair

hell, hell, in hell,

trapped like a fish to bake

here and burn.

hell, hell, inside my brain

inside my gut,

hell hanging

twisting

screaming

churning

then crouching still

both inside

and outside of

me.

hell,

hell in the trees,

on the ground,

crawling on the rug.

hell,

bouncing off

the

walls and

ceiling as

I sit in this chair here

as outside

through the window

I watch

6 or 7 telephone wires

taut against the

sky

as fresh hell slides

toward me

along the wires.

hell is where I

am.

and I am

here.

there isn’t any

place

else.

see me now

reaching for a

cigarette,

my hand pushing

through boiling space.

there is nothing more

I can do.

I light the

cigarette,

lean back here

alone

in

this

chair.

talking about the poets

“correctly so,” I told him,

“I would much rather they all

robbed banks or sold

drugs and if you please may

I have a vodka-7?”

“I agree,” said the

barkeep mixing the

drink, “I’d rather they

collected garbage

or ran for Congress

or taught

biology.”

“or,” I said, reaching

for the drink, “sold

flowers on the corner

or gave back rubs or

tried blowing glass.”

“absolutely right,” said

the barkeep

pouring himself a

drink, “I’d rather they

plowed the good

earth or

delivered the mail.”

“or,” I said, “mugged

old ladies or

pulled teeth.”

“or directed traffic or

worked the factories,”

said the barkeep, “or

caught the bus to

the nearest harvest.”

“that will be a great day,” I said,

“when it arrives.”

“beautiful,” said the

barkeep, “but isn’t it the

mediocrity of the masses

which diminishes the

wealth of its entertainers

and artists?”

“absolutely not,” I said, “and may I

have another vodka- 7?”

“if I was the policeman

of the world,” the barkeep

continued, moving the drink

toward me, “many a darling

poet would either be allowed to

starve or forced to get a

real job.”

“and correctly so,” I

said, raising my

drink.

“that will be a beautiful day,”

said the barkeep,

“when it arrives.”

“a hell of a beautiful

day,” I agreed.

was Li Po wrong?

you know what Li Po said when asked if he’d rather be an

Artist or Rich?

“I’d rather be Rich,” he replied, “for Artists can usually be found

sitting on the doorsteps of the

Rich.”

I’ve sat on the doorsteps of some expensive and

unbelievable homes

myself

but somehow I always managed to disgrace myself and / or insult

my Rich hosts

(mostly after drinking large quantities of their fine

liquor).

perhaps I was afraid of the Rich?

all I knew then was poverty and the very poor,

and I felt instinctively that the Rich shouldn’t be so

Rich,

that it was some kind of clever

twist of fate

based on something rotten and

unfair.

of course, one could say the same thing

about being poor,

only there were so many poor, it all seemed completely

out of proportion.

and so when I, as an Artist, visited the

homes of the Rich, I felt ashamed to be

there, and I drank too much of their fine wines,

broke their expensive glassware and antique dishes,

burned cigarette holes in their Persian rugs and

mauled their wives,

reacting badly to the whole damned

situation.

yet I had no political or social solution.

I was just a lousy houseguest,

I guess,

and after a while

I protected both myself and the Rich

by rejecting their

invitations

and everybody felt much better after

that.

I went back to

drinking alone,

breaking my own cheap glassware,

filling the room with cigar

smoke and feeling

wonderful

instead of feeling trapped,

used,

pissed on,

fucked.

operator

the phone doesn’t ring.

the hours hang limp and empty.

everybody else is having it

all.

it seems to never end.

one night it got very bad.

I needed just a voice.

I dialed the time on the

telephone and listened to her

voice as she said:

“it’s eleven ten and ten seconds.

it’s eleven ten and twenty seconds.

it’s eleven ten and thirty seconds …”

then she told me that it

was:

“eleven ten and forty seconds.”

she might have saved my life

although I’m not sure.

a note from Hades in the mailbox

it reads:

Mr. Chinaski, we stopped by to see if

you’re interested in a free lunch.

we’ll stop by again later this

afternoon.

we’ll bring some beer.

it is now 2 p.m.

call meanwhile if you’re interested.

397- 8211

Steve and Frank

on the sunny banks of the university

I think that all the decades of teaching English

Lit has gotten to him.

his own writing has become more and more

comfortable.

he has survived, he has held on to his job, he has

changed wives (often).

but it was all just too easy, really, teaching those Lit

classes

and coasting along and by

doing that he has missed out on something important,

reality perhaps,

and it’s beginning to show.

each new book of poetry gets more and more

comfortable (as I said earlier).

I think good poetry should startle, shatter and,

yes, entertain while getting as close to the truth as

possible.

I can get all the comfort I need from a good

cigar.

if this gentleman expects his own poetry to be taught

by others

in future English

Lit classes

he’d better get his ass out of the warm sand

and start splashing in the bloody waters of real

life.

or maybe he’d just rather be a good old guy

forever,

adored and comforted by the eager young

coeds.

that’s not so bad, really,

considering that you get paid very well for

that.

vacation in Greece

it was 4 years ago, she told me,

and we were on a private beach,

on the Mediterranean

my sister and I—

my sister is 18 and she has

long and lovely

legs,

and these 3 beautiful young men

bronzed and slim

put their blankets near ours;

one was an Englishman, one was a Scotsman

and the other might have been

Greek or Italian.

my sister and I started spreading oil on our

bodies, you

know, and it was all going well, you could

feel the vibes—

then this boy of 12 walked up,

he was bowlegged, had acne,

a very scruffy boy,

and he started speaking to the men

and the men talked to him

and one of the men gave him a cigarette

and the boy stood there

smoking the cigarette

not inhaling

and then one of the men got up

and went into the water with the boy

behind some rocks

where the water was shallow

and the man and the boy

stayed there quite a while.

then they came back.

then

the men got up, folded their blankets

and walked off.

the boy stood there

smoking another cigarette, not

inhaling.

I asked him:

“how did you get in here? it’s a

private beach.”

the boy pointed to a fence behind us.

“it was easy,” he said, “there’a hole in

the fence.”

his English was terrible.

and then he walked away along the shore with his bowlegs,

such a scruffy boy.

the spill

the jock’s horse

the 7 horse

clipped the heels

of the horse

in front of

him

stumbled and

fell

throwing the

jock

over its

head

and onto the

track before

some

oncoming

horses

most of

which

avoided the

jock’s

still

form

except for

the 9

horse

who gave him

one step

in the middle

of his

back

you could

see

the hoof

dig

in

then the

field was

past

and the

ambulance was

on its

way

the jock wore

Kelly green

silks,

black

sleeves.

3 or 4

people were now

gathered around

the

still

jock.

as the ambulance

moved in

the man behind

me

said to his

companion,

“let’s go get

a

beer.”

the last salamander

it’s freezing again, and the snitch is sucking up

to the warden. I’m down $20 with six to go, someone stole

the bell and Darlene broke her left kneecap; the hunter

weeps in the bracken, and in the mirror I see pennies for

eyes; this war is like a dead green shawl

as the last salamander

gets ready to

die.

I am down $50 with four to go,

the boy broke the mower on an apricot and

the skyscraper trembles in the bleeding January night.

I am down $100 with two to go, I will double up

face down, go for broke, and it

might be time for a trip to Spain or to buy

one last pair of new shoes.

it gets sad; the walls grip my

fingers and smile;

I know who killed Cock Robin; I know who tricked Benny

the Dip; and

now somebody is picking the lock and the searchlights are

out of focus.

I’m down $500 with one to go,

my horse explodes in the middle of the dream,

it’s really freezing now, can’t

get it up

can’t

get it down

can’t

get it;

a chorus of purple songbirds

shakes the trees; I watch a parade of wooden monkeys

burn; as the tin cock crows, I just don’t

understand.

learning the ropes

he was my guru.

he was a big man, bearded, self-assured.

he sat in one chair.

I sat in another.

we had been up together many days

and nights.

there had been an hour’s heavy

silence.

then he leaned forward slightly

and whispered,

“you don’t have to worry about

worms when you die, Chinaski,

worms don’t infest dead

bodies, it’s a fairy tale.”

“that’s good to know,” I

said.

then we fell into another

hour’s heavy

silence.

bombed away

when I was younger

when we were all younger

one of T. S. Eliot’s most admired

and envied

lines

was:

“this is the way the world

ends,

not with a bang

but a

whimper.”

before Hiroshima

we all wished we had written that immortal

line.

however

poor T.S. lost

much of his immortality

because of that

monstrous

event.

but at least

he had his immortal status

for a

while

and like the old fighter

Beau Jack said

after blowing his fortune on

parties, suckerfish and

women:

“it beats not ever having been

the champ.”

these days

we don’t know how

or

when

the world will

conclude.

and under the circumstances,

the idea of

an immortal line or poem

seems somewhat

optimistic

not to mention the fact that

most of us now

do our whimpering long

before any possible

end.

the swimming pool will be going here

Mr. Cobweb, call me when the applause breaks out like a sprinkle of

henshit; 1671 wasn’t so long ago and tomorrow waits like a headless

anvil; but I’m still able to reach for my handkerchief

and wave to the ever-dancing girls (what dolls!) stomping away as

my brain in that dark cellar simmers in the stew.

sure, good things keep happening, eh? I mean, sometimes I fear

that I’m going to explode right through the top of my skull:

teeth, lungs, intestines, liver, bladder, balls and all, and

for hardly any reason! I’ve

got to be nuts, you

know! hope

so.

Mr. Cobweb, call me, I have an answering service, and oh yes, my friend

the great actor stuck his foot down into the dirt behind his mansion in

Malibu Canyon and told me: “the swimming pool will be going

here.”

mainly, though, what I like is how the sun keeps on trying and we

build sidewalks and walk on them, we go up and down in elevators, read

newspapers, take issue with events singular and worldly, keep exercising,

we keep going and going, it’s all rather fresh and exciting,

and new girls continue to get up to dance, those beautiful dancing

girls, I clutch the blade in my teeth and grin at them, Mr.

Cobweb!

and, Mr. Cobweb, there was another great actor, he was sitting with

his drink, looking down into his drink, he had a long thin sad neck

and I walked over and said, “listen, Harry, you’re always depressed, get

over it, you’re at the top of your game, things could be a lot worse, you

could be servicing Hondas at Jiffy Lube …”

Mr. Cobweb, even 1332 wasn’t so long ago, we are all blessed in this life,

looking around and trying to fit ourselves into the puzzle, it takes time,

a lifetime, many lifetimes, but we have to keep trying and that takes guts.

me? shit, I’ve had enough, it’s grand, sure, but let me nudge

out now. I distrust the whole tawdry game.

Mr. Cobweb, Al Capone has been dead a long time but it doesn’t seem so

long to me, I sit within these brown-yellow walls and there’s an old

rose stuck in an old drinking glass, it’s been there several months looking

at me and I reach out and touch it—the petals are still there but

they feel strangely like paper; why shouldn’t they, huh?

Mr. Cobweb, you tell the funniest jokes I’ve ever heard!

so call me any time, I always answer on the fourth ring, for

sure.

a bright boy

I was in one of those after-hour places.

I don’t know how long I had been there when

I noticed a dead cigar in my hand. I attempted

to light it and burned my nose.

“you ever meet Randy Newhall?” the guy

next to me asked.

“no …”

“he went through college in 2 years instead

of 4.”

I asked the barkeep to bring us a couple more

drinks.

“then he walked into the largest employment agency

in town, they had 50 applications for this

one job at a talent agency but

he just talked to the manager for 15

minutes and was hired.”

“uh …”

“he began in the mailroom and in 12 months he

was making package deals for tv programs

and movies.

nobody ever got out of the mailroom that

fast, and next he married a rich girl

just out of law school.”

“yeah?”

“after that he spent most of his

time putting golf balls into a water glass

in his office.

he made the work look easy …”

“listen,” I asked, “what time is it? the

battery in my watch went dead.”

“… and in another year

he was promoted to upper management and

a year later he took over the whole place.

he was

the youngest CEO in America.”

“you buy the next round,” I told him.

“sure, well, he doubled his work hours and

after a while his wife left him—women don’t

understand.”

“what?”

“guys like him.”

“oh …”

“he didn’t contest the divorce.

he just moved on. it didn’t faze him one bit.

it was amazing, you’d

see him having dinner with congressmen, with

the mayor.”

“are you going to get the next round?”

he told the barkeep, who brought two more.

“then he began working 16- and 18-hour

days and after work he’d frequent

after-hour places above the Sunset Strip, to relax,

to try to unwind.”

“a place like this, huh?”

“this was the place. he didn’t try to close

deals, he just wanted to relax with the

actors, the artists, the screenwriters, the

directors, the producers, the investors

and so forth. and, of course, there were also the

beautiful girls.”

“here?”

“yes, look around …”

I did.

“well, it was just a matter of time until he discovered

coke, then more coke, mostly with his new friends

after the after-hour places closed.”

“flying, what?”

“yes, but professionally he

continued to function well until

he began doing crank.”

“it really keeps you awake, huh? my

round to buy …”

I ordered two more.

“after some months he felt more and more

depressed, he took 6 weeks off and went to

Hawaii, resting, laying in the sun.”

“did he screw?”

“he told me that he tried. anyhow, he came back

and he used to talk to me here just like you’re

doing now.”

“oh.”

“then he became obsessed with some Mexican Real

Estate Dream

which

he would bankroll

with a Mexican friend

who was powerful in politics there.

the master plan was that

within 8 years they would control

a real estate empire and

several banks before the

government could stop them.

“drink up,” I suggested.

“well, they didn’t quite get it rolling.

he lost everything.

at the office he became difficult and unreasonable,

smashing ashtrays, throwing the phone out the window,

once pouring a can of Tab down his secretary’s

blouse. yet somehow he managed to retain an

obnoxious brilliance and he remained almost functional

which was better than most of the others there.”

“most others don’t have much.”

“that’s true. anyhow, one day he arrived at work

dressed in a house painter’s outfit, you know, the

white overalls, the little white cap, carrying a brush and a

bucket of paint. that’s when the Board of Directors

insisted on a 3-month leave of absence.”

“BARKEEP!” I yelled. “COUPLE MORE!”

“he sold his house and moved into an apartment

on Fountain Avenue. his friends came by for

a while, then they stopped.”

“suckerfish like winners.”

“yes, and then there was a period when he tried to

get back with his x-wife but she didn’t want any more

of that. she was with a young sculptor from Boston

who was immensely talented and who taught

at an Ivy League university.”

“a rough turn of events,” I said.

“anyhow, our friend had this apartment

on Fountain Avenue and

one day the manager who lived in the apartment

below noticed water coming down through the

ceiling …”

“oh?”

“he ran upstairs and knocked on the door, there

was no answer, he took out his key and opened it, went

in and there was Randy standing there like a statue,

his head down in the bathroom sink, the water

running and overflowing,

running over the floor, and the manager wasn’t sure what

to think, it looked so strange, and he went over and

saw that the head was wedged there in the sink,

and the manager felt his legs, his back, and everything

was stiff, rigor mortis had long ago set in, there he

was standing with his head down under the water

and the overhead light on …”

“listen, Monty,” I said, “your name is ‘Monty,’ isn’t

it?”

“yes, you’ve got it right.”

“I drove over here earlier but that was such a long time ago.

do you remember if the parking lot is out front

or in the back?”

“it’s straight out back.”

“goodnight, Monty.”

“goodnight.”

fortunately after all that

I still knew front from back. I climbed down off

that bar stool and made my way as best I could to the

exit.

my turn

the male reviewer writes that he

misses the poems about

the drinking bouts and the hard

women and the low

life.

the female reviewer says that

all I write about

is drinking and puking and bad

women

and a life nobody could

ever care

about.

their reviews are

on the same page

and are about

the same book

and

this is a poem

about

book reviewers.

skinny-dipping

as a young man

he went skinny-dipping with

Kafka

but it was too much

for him:

the sun burned him badly

and he was in bed

for two days

with a high

fever.

he was fat

and in great pain

as he twisted in the

sheets.

now Kafka didn’t get burned

and he visited the fat

boy

and the fat boy’s

mother

gave Kafka

hell.

and life continued.

and the fat boy

went on to write many

books and he became

famous in his own

time

while Kafka only wrote

a few books and remained

unknown.

the fat boy

even went on to live

comfortably in Paris

with a wife of some

importance

and they mixed with

many of the

great artists of their

day

while Kafka remained

unknown

and life continued.

a close call

pushing my cart through the supermarket

today

the thought crossed my mind

that I could start

knocking cans from the shelves and swiping

at rolls of towels, toilet paper and

silver foil,

I could throw oranges, bananas, tomatoes

into the air, I could take cans of

beer from the refrigerator and roll

them down the aisle, I could pull up

women’s skirts and grab their asses,

I could ram my shopping cart through

the plate glass window.

then another thought occurred to me:

people generally consider the consequences

before they do something

like that.

I pushed my cart along.

a young woman in a checkered skirt was

bending over in the pet food section.

I seriously considered grabbing her

ass

but I didn’t, I rolled on

by.

I had the items I needed and I pushed

my cart up to the checkout stand.

a lady in a red smock with a nameplate

waited on me.

the nameplate indicated her name was

“Robin.”

Robin looked at me: “how you doing?”

she asked.

“fine,” I told her.

and then she began tabulating and

bagging my purchases

with no idea that

the fellow standing there before her

had just two minutes ago been

one small step away from the

madhouse.

like a rock

through early evening

I

sit alone

listening to the sound of

the heater;

I fall into myself

like a rock dropped into some

ungrand canyon.

it hits bottom. I

lift my drink.

unfortunately

my hell is not any more hell

than the hell of a

fly.

that’s what makes it

difficult. and

nothing is less

profound than a

melancholy

drunk.

I must remember:

the death or the murder of a

drunk matters

less

than

nothing.

spider, on the wall:

why do you take

so long?

the waitress at the yogurt shop

is young, quite young,

and the boys are lined up on the bench

waiting for a table

as she waits on customers.

the boys say sly and

daring things to her

in very low voices.

they all want to

bed down with her

or

at least

get her

attention.

she hears the

whispered remarks,

really likes hearing them

but says,

again and again,

“shut up! oh, you shut up!”

it goes on and

on:

the boys continue and

she continues:

“oh, shut up!”

in a voice without

grace or melody

in a voice

without warmth or humor

in a voice

remarkably

ugly:

“oh, shut up now!”

but the eager boys

are not aware of her

tone of

voice

and the one who will

finally live with that

voice

is probably not yet sitting

there.

her husband of the

future

will finally understand

the horrible reality of

that voice

(remember,

the voice is the window

to the soul)

and he will think:

oh my god

oh my god

oh my god

what have I

done?

won’t

she

ever

shut up?

one out in the minor leagues

men on 2nd and 3rd.

first base was open.

one out.

we gave Parker an

intentional walk.

we had a 3- to- 2

lead.

last half of the

9th, Simpson on the

mound.

Tanner up.

Simpson let it go.

it was low and

inside.

Tanner tapped it

to our shortstop,

DeMarco.

perfect double play

ball.

DeMarco gloved it,

flipped it to Johnson

our 2b man.

Johnson touched 2nd

then stood there

holding the ball as

the runners were

steaming around

the bases.

I screamed at Johnson

from the dugout:

“DO SOMETHING WITH THE

GODDAMNED BALL!”

the whole stadium was

screaming.

Johnson just stood there

a funny look on his face

with the ball.

then

he fell forward

still holding the ball.

he was

stretched out there as

the winning run

scored.

the dugout emptied

as we ran

to Johnson.

we turned him

over.

he wasn’t moving.

he looked

dead.

the trainer took

his pulse and

looked at me.

then he started

mouth-to-mouth.

the announcer asked

if there was a

doctor in the

stands.

two of them came

down.

one of them

was drunk.

the tiny crowd started

coming

out on the field.

the ushers pushed

them back.

somebody took the

ball out of Johnson’s

hand.

they worked on him

for a long time.

there was a

camera flash.

then another.

then the doctor

stood up:

“it’s no good.

he’s gone.”

the stretcher

came out and

we loaded Johnson

onto the stretcher.

somebody threw a

warm-up

jacket

over his face.

the stadium was

almost deserted as

they carried Johnson

off the field

through

the dugout

and into

the locker room.

I didn’t go

in.

I took a cup of water

from the cooler

and

sat alone on the bench.

Toby the batboy

came over.

“what’s going to happen now, Mr.

Quinn?” he asked.

“our 2nd baseman is

dead, Toby.”

“who you going to play

there now?”

“I don’t think that’s

important right now,” I

told him.

“yes, it is, Mr. Quinn!

we’re 2 games out of

first place

going into September!”

“I’ll think of something,

Toby …”

then I got up and went

through the door

to the locker room,

Toby following right

behind.

the little girls hissed

since my last name was Fuch, he said to Raymond, you can

believe the school yard was tough: they put itching

powder down my neck, threw gravel at me, stung me

with rubber bands in class, and outside they called

me names, well, one name mainly, over and over,

and on top of all that my parents were poor, I wore

cardboard in my shoes to fill in the holes in the

soles, my pants were patched, my shirts thread-

bare; and even my teachers ganged up

on me, they slammed my

palm with rulers and sent me to the principal’s office as

if I was really guilty of something;

and, of course, the abuse kept coming from my classmates;

I was stoned, beaten, pissed on;

the little girls hissed and stuck their tongues out

at me …

Fuch’s wife smiled sadly at Raymond: my poor darling husband had such

a terrible childhood!

(she was so beautiful it almost stunned one to look at

her.)

Fuch looked at Raymond: hey, your glass is empty.

yeah, said Raymond.

Fuch touched a button and the English butler silently

glided in. he nodded respectfully to Raymond and in his

beautiful accent asked, another drink, sir?

yes, please, Raymond answered.

the butler went off to prepare the drink.

what hurt most, of course, continued Fuch, was the name-

calling.

Raymond asked, have you never forgotten it?

I did for a while, but then strangely I began to

miss the abuse …

the butler returned carrying Raymond’s

drink on a silver tray.

here is your drink, sir, said the butler.

thank you, said Raymond, taking it off the tray.

o.k., Paul, Fuch said to the butler, you can

start now.

now? asked the butler.

now, came the answer.

the butler stood in front of Fuch and screamed:

fucky-boy! fucky-baby! fuck-face! fuck-brain!

where did your name come from, fuck-head?

how come you’re such a fuck-up?

etc….

they all started laughing uncontrollably

as the butler delivered his tirade in that

beautiful British accent.

they couldn’t stop laughing, they fell out of their

chairs and got down on the rug, pounding it and

laughing, Fuch, his lovely young wife and Raymond

in that sprawling mansion overlooking the shining sea.

I dreamt

that I was

in my room

having been

shot in the belly

by some tart.

snakes crawled the

floor

while outside

a schoolmaster

sang

an old school

song

then

the curtains

went up in

flame

the phone

rang

everything

seemed

in a hurry

to die

so I

decided to

die

which made all the

bad poets

happy

and all the good poets

glad

as they

rushed in

to fill

the vacancy

then the dream

was

over

I awakened

and I was

the Bad Boy

of poetry

all over

again.

the old couple next door

they were an old couple

and she slept with her

head at one end of the

bed

and he with his head

at the other

end.

they explained that

in case somebody

came in to murder

them

at least one of them

would have a

better chance to

escape.

when he died

she had a stuffed replica

made of his

body

and she slept with

her head at one end

of the bed

and the replica’s

head was down at the

other.

and just like in the

past,

at least once every

night,

she would awaken

in a fury and

scream,

“STOP

THAT

GODDAMNED

SNORING!”

men without women

finally,

goaded by the high price of

female relationships

he lashed his ankles to the

bedpoles

and tried to reach his

own

penis

with his

mouth:

close but no

cigar.

another of

nature’s dirty

tricks.

finally, in a

fury, he gave it a last

mad

attempt.

something cracked in his

back

and a blue flame

engulfed his

brain.

after 45 minutes of

agony

he got himself off

the bed,

found he couldn’t stand

straight.

each time he tried

a hundred knives cut

into both his back and

his soul.

the next day

he managed to drive to

the doctor’s

office

bent low over the

steering wheel

barely able to

see through the

windshield.

“how did you do this?”

the

doctor

asked.

he told the doctor

the honest

truth

because he felt

that an informed

diagnosis

was the only chance

for a complete

cure.

“what?” said the

doctor. “you’re

kidding?”

“no, that’s what

happened.”

“please excuse me,

I’ll be right

back.”

there was a dead

silence.

then he heard the

soft laughter of

the doctor and the

nurse from

behind the door.

then it grew

louder.

he sat there

looking out the office

window: there was a park outside

with lovely mature trees, it was

a fine summer afternoon

the birds were out in force and

for some odd reason

he longed for a shimmering bowl

of cool wet grapes.

the laughter behind the door

grew softer again

and then died out

as he sat there

waiting.

the “Beats”

some keep trying to connect me with

the “Beats”

but I was almost unpublished in the

1950s

and

even then

I very much

distrusted their vanity and

all that

public

posturing.

and when I met a few of them

later in life

I realized that most of my original

feelings for

them

hadn’t

changed.

some of my friends accepted

that; others thought that I

should change my

opinion.

my opinion remains the

same: writing is done

one person

at a time

one place

at a time

and all the gatherings

of

the

flock

have very little

to do

with

anything.

any one of them

could have made

a decent living as a

bill collector or a

used car

salesman

and they still

could

make an honest living

instead of bitching about

changes of fashion and

the ways of fate.

but instead

from the sad university

lecterns

and in the poetry halls

these hucksters of the

despoiled word

are still clamoring for

handouts,

still talking the same

dumb

shit.

hurry slowly

when will you take to the cane,

Chinaski?

when will you walk that short-legged

dog into the last

sunset?

that wrinkled-nosed dog

snorting and sniffing

before you

as the sidewalks part

and the ocean roars in

bearing beautiful

mermaids.

straighten your back,

the sun is rushing past

you,

grin at the gods,

they only lent you the luck and the

mirage.

Chinaski?

you hear me?

the young girls of your dreams

have grown old.

Chinaski,

let it go,

the music has finished.

Chinaski?

Chinaski, don’t you hear

me?

why do you keep trying?

nobody is watching.

nobody cares,

not even you.

you are alone, Chinaski,

and below the stage

the seats are

empty.

the theatre is dark.

why do you keep

acting?

what a bad

habit.

the air is so still,

the air is black and still as

you move through the last of

yourself,

give way, give way

old poet,

hanging by the last thread,

use your courage

write that last line,

get out, get out, get out,

get out, get out, get out,

it’s easy,

the last classic

act.

the coast is clear,

now.

hello and goodbye

there’s no hell like your own hell,

none can compare,

twisting in the sheets at night,

your ass freezing,

your mind on fire,

everything stupid, stupid,

as you are stuck in your poor body and in

your poor life

and it’s all slowly dissolving, dissolving

into nothing.

like all the other bodies, like all the other

lives,

we all are being counted out,

taken down

by disease

by just being rubbed up against

the hard days, the harder years.

there’s no escaping

this,

we just have to take it,

accept it—

or like most—

not think about it.

at all.

shoes off and on.

holidays come and gone.

hello,

goodbye.

dress, undress.

eat, sleep.

drive an automobile.

pay your taxes.

wash under the arms and

behind the neck

and scrub everything

else, for sure.

pick your coffin ahead

of time.

feel the smooth wood.

go for the soft, padded, expensive

interior.

the salesman will commend you

on your good

taste.

then horrify him.

tell him you want to try it for

size.

there’s no hell like your own

hell and there’s nobody else

ever

to share it with

you.

you might as well be the only

person left on earth.

sometimes you feel as if you

were.

and maybe you are.

meanwhile, pluck the lint from

your belly button,

accept what is,

get laid once in a while,

shake hands with nothing at all.

it’s always been like this, it’s always been like

this.

don’t scream.

there’s nobody left to hear

you.

strange things,

strange things these cities, the trees,

our feet walking the sidewalks,

the blood inside us

lubricating our

hearts,

the centuries finally shot apart

as you slip on your stockings and pull them

up over your

ankles.

I will never have

a house in the valley

with little stone men

on the lawn.

don’t call me, I’ll call you

once more

the typing is about

finished

poems scatter the

floor

this smoky room

the radio whispers

the symphony of a

dead

man

the lamp

looks at me

from my

left

it is late

night

moving

into

morning

I have lived

again

the lucky

hours

then the

phone

rings

son-of-a-

bitch:

impossible!

but my wife

will get

the

phone

perhaps

it’s for

her

it can’t be

for

me

I’d kill

anybody

who would

spoil

what

the gods

have sent

this old

fellow

once

again

as the dark

trees

shake

outside

as death

finally

is a monkey

caught

in a

cage.

taking the 8 count

“today,” says the radio announcer,

“is Bastille Day.

203 years ago they stormed the Bastille,”

and that is the highlight of my day.

I have really been burnt out lately.

I go outside,

undress,

get in the pool, wrap my blue

floater around my gut

and water-jog.

I feel like an old man.

hell, I am an old man.

when I was born it was only 132 years back to

Bastille Day.

now, pains in my right leg and foot make for

a long day at the track

and the decades cling to me like

leeches,

sucking my energy and

my spirit.

but I intend to make a comeback

very soon.

I need the action, the gamble.

now I am drinking a cold beer.

I relax and just float.

suddenly things look better.

the leg and foot no longer hurt.

I even begin to feel good.

I’m not done yet!

I will remain in the arena.

hail, Bastille Day!

hail all the old dogs!

hail you!

hail me!

that last good

night is not yet here.

going going gone

my wife doesn’t see much of me

anymore

since she got me this computer

for Xmas.

I never thought anything could consume

me like it

has.

the poems arrive by the

dozens

and yesterday there was even a decent bit

of prose.

I’ve now gone the complete route.

I once hand-printed all my poems and

stories.

then came the manual

typewriter.

then the electric typer.

and now this.

it’s as if I have been reborn.

I watch the words form on the

screen

and as I watch more and more

words

form.

and, actually, the content seems

to be

as good as ever.

things get said as they have

always been said.

only now it’s more like setting off

firecrackers or

exploding words into outer

space.

I’ve been told that the computer

can’t write for me.

hell, I don’t know, this thing

seems to have a

psyche

all its own

and it certainly spells

better than I

do.

there were always words

I wanted to use

but I was too lazy to

check the

spelling.

so I used a simpler version

or just didn’t

bother.

now I toss the word

in,

then ask the computer if

I’ve got it spelled

right.

there’s an old theory

that if you put ten thousand

monkeys in a room for

Eternity

they would eventually

rewrite every great novel

ever written,

word for word.

with a computer

they’d do it

in half an

hour.

anyhow, I’m more or less

one of those

monkeys now

and my wife hardly ever

sees me anymore, as I said

before.

I hear her coughing in the

next room

so I know that she is

there.

but that’s enough

computer talk.

it’s time for another

poem.

this is where they come for what’s left of your soul

the books are selling, there are critical articles, more and

more critical articles that claim my work is, indeed,

at last, pretty damned good.

I am being taught alongside some of the masters.

a dangerous time, a most dangerous time

for me.

if I accept my new position, then I must work from that new

position.

I must then attempt to hold my ground, not

despoil it.

but I have watched too many others

soften, lose their natural force.

too much acceptance destroys.

so listen, my fine fellows and ladies, I am going to

ignore your late applause,

I intend to still play it loose, commit my errors,

enrage the entrenched and piss upon your

guardians, angels and / or devils.

I intend to do what I

have to do, what I have always done.

it’s been too much fun to falter now.

you will not escape my iron grip

and I will escape

yours.

hot night

like this, sitting in my shorts, listening to a tenor

all the way from Cleveland

garnering applause on the radio.

I’ve never been to Cleveland.

I sit here in my shorts on a humid night

now listening to Ravel with my gut hanging out

over my shorts.

my soft white gut.

I draw on this cigar, inhale, then blow

blue smoke as

Ravel waltzes.

I read a fan letter written to me from Japan.

then I rip it once, twice, three times, trash

it.

young girls send me photos of their naked

selves.

blank-faced, I set my lighter to the photos,

turn them to twisted black

ash.

it’s midnight and I’m too dumb to

sweat.

“oil and natural gas,” says the man on the radio,

“we need oil and natural gas

for the nation’s energy needs.”

“fuck you, buddy,” I say.

I scratch, yawn, rise, walk

to where my little refrigerator holds food

and drink.

it takes me 7 steps to get there.

one for each decade.

did you know that

to this very day

nobody can figure out how

they built the

pyramids?

the x-bum

it was a good training ground out there

(although there were times

of fear and madness)

and there were times when it wasn’t kind

and there were times when my comrades were

cowardly

treacherous

or

debased.

it taught me also

that there was no bottom to life

you could always fall lower

into a bestial groveling

and when you reached

that point

nobody cared or would ever

care.

and then, with no feelings left, that was the strangest

feeling of them

all.

so, today I got into my BMW, drove to my

bank and picked up my American Express

Gold Card. (I always promised myself that I’d

write about that when it

happened.)

I know what people will say: “Chinaski! writing about

his American Express Gold Card! who gives a damn

about that? or who cares that he’s now in

Who’s Who in America?”

I can’t think of another poet who makes people as

angry as I do.

I enjoy it

knowing that we are all brothers and sisters

in a very unkind extended

family

and I also never forget that

no matter

what the circumstances,

the park bench is never that far away

from any one of

us.

something cares

a reader writes from Germany

that a lady friend saw me interviewed

on tv and then

told him

that to kiss my face would be a

disgusting thing.

I wrote back that

she might be right, I didn’t know,

I’d never actually tried

it.

but really

I don’t write with my

face

I use my fingers

and this old Olympia

standard,

and with all the luck

I’ve had

I should kiss this

typer

but

I won’t.

well, there, I just

did.

it was a cold kiss

but a faithful

one.

and now the machine

answers back:

I love you too,

old boy.

my cats

I know. I know.

they are limited, have different

needs and

concerns.

but I watch and learn from them.

I like the little they know,

which is so

much.

they complain but never

worry.

they walk with a surprising dignity.

they sleep with a direct simplicity that

humans just can’t

understand.

their eyes are more

beautiful than our eyes.

and they can sleep 20 hours

a day

without

hesitation or

remorse.

when I am feeling

low

all I have to do is

watch my cats

and my

courage

returns.

I study these

creatures.

they are my

teachers.

6:30 a.m.

fondly embracing mad hopes in my dreams the first intrusion

of day begins when that young cat of mine starts knocking

over and attacking things at 6:30 in the

morning. I rise to lead that frisky rascal down the

stairway and open the door where he always pauses

introspectively until I give him a gentle boot in the ass

and then he is gone into the blissful glory of the day while I then

climb back up the stairway to bed down again with wife who

has heard nothing who sleeps so still I must check

her breathing to make certain she’s alive and finding that

she’s o.k. I pull the covers up. I have the best hours of

sleep then before the long drive to the racetrack

one more time one more time and one more time again

until I get so old that the DMV will take away my driver’s

license and I will have to ride the bus out there

with the damned ghost people son-of-a-bitch what an

awful goddamned thought better to stay home with wife and

cats putter with paints a la Henry Miller and also

help with the weeding and the shopping while the last of

the sun slants in like a golden sword.

what I need

I need a light pine kitchen, a new freezer, a picture window,

a first-alert ready-light, a pair of jogging shoes, some real

excitement, a yellow banjo, hot chips, a spark, two love birds,

sheer stockings, a touch of miracle, a March star, a true woman, a

new fantasy, a spicy sky, a charmed quark, some luck, a

VISA card, a walrus, a sunset at the beach, a well-

seasoned cigar, an antelope, a racy subject, an ideal to fight for, a

rainbow, a halcyon holiday and

a winner in the first, a winner in the second, a winner in the

third, a winner in the fourth, a winner in the

fifth.

hell, that’s what I got just now: a winner in the

fifth!

couldn’t you

guess?

gender benders

I’m only guessing, of course, as

usual but here goes:

when the ladies gather over

cocktails they talk about

how their husbands tend to

stifle them, smother their creative

instinct, their natural joy,

their ultimate female

selves.

without their husbands they

would float free

and thrive and grow

without limit

as they were meant to do.

but ladies, I will tell you

this:

when men gather they

never talk about their

wives.

we discuss the

Dallas Cowboys

or the new barmaid at

The Bat Cove Tavern

or about how Tyson would

kick Holyfield’s ass …

unconcerned with

petty argument

we have floated free …

giant macho soaring

balloons!

WHEE!

after many nights

the last hour at the typewriter is only

good

if you’ve had a lucky and

productive

night,

otherwise

your time and effort have been

wasted.

this night

I feel good about the poems scattered

on the floor.

the door of this room is

open

and I can see out into the

night,

see part of the city to

my left;

see many lights—yellow, white

red, blue;

see also the moving lights

of the cars

traveling south on the

Harbor Freeway.

the lights of this city

are not at rest,

they shimmer in the

dark.

a blue tree outside the

window

looms powerful and at

peace.

my death,

after so many nights

like this,

will seem

logical,

sane

and

(like a few of my poems)

well-

written.

good morning, how are you?

$650,000 home, swimming pool, tennis court,

sauna, 4 late-model cars, a starlet wife;

he was blond, young, broad-shouldered, great

smile, great sense of humor.

he was an investor, said his starlet wife.

but he always seemed to be at home.

one afternoon

while he was playing tennis with his friends

two plainclothes cops

walked up

handcuffed him

took him

off.

it was in the papers the next day: he was a

hit man wanted for killing over fifty

men.

what bothered the neighbors most was

not who would move in next

but

when

had he found time to do it?

a reader of my work

what will you write about? he asks.

you no longer live with whores, you no

longer engage in barroom brawls, what

will you write about?

he seems to think that I’ve manufactured

a life to suit my typewriter

and if my life gets good

my writing will get bad.

I tell him that trouble will always

arrive, never worry about

that.

he doesn’t seem to understand.

he asks,

what will your readers

think?

Norman Mailer still has

his readers,

I say.

but you’re different,

he says.

not at all, I say,

we’re both about

25 pounds

overweight.

he stares at me

unblinking

through dull

gray

eyes.

Sumatra Cum Laude

sitting across from my lawyer, I

decide, at this time, one needs a good

lawyer, a tax accountant, a decent

auto mechanic, a sympathetic doctor and

a faithful wife, in order to

survive.

also, one needs some talent of one’s own,

very few friends, a good home security

system and the ability to sleep peacefully at

night.

you need at least this much in order to

get by and naturally you also must

hope to evade a long illness and / or

senility; finally, you can only

pray for a quick clean finish with

very little subsequent mourning by everybody

closely connected.

sitting across from my lawyer, I

have these thoughts.

we are on the 16th floor of a downtown office

building

and I like my lawyer, he has fine eyes,

great manners.

also, he has gotten my ass out of

several jams.

(meanwhile, among other things, you also need

a plumber who doesn’t overbill and

an honest jockey who knows where the

finish line is.)

you need all the above (and more) before

you can go home with a clear mind, open a

wooden box labeled Sumatra Cum

Laude, take one out, light it

and take a quick puff or two

before the bluebird leaves

your shoulder,

before the snow melts,

and before the rain and the traffic

and our hurly-burly life

churn everything into

black

slush.

the disease of existence

dark, dark, dark.

humanity’s shadow

shrouds the moon.

the process is

eternal.

once, I imagined that

in my old age

there would be

peace,

but not this:

dark humanity’s

insufferable

relentless

presence.

humanity claws

at me

as persistently

now

as in the

beginning.

I was not born to be

one with them

yet here I am

with only

the thought

of death

and that final

separation

to comfort me.

so there’s no chance,

no

hope,

just this waiting,

sitting here

tonight

surrounded

unsure

caught

transfixed,

the hours, the years,

this minute,

mutilated.

another comeback

climbing back up out of the ooze, out of

the thick black tar,

rising up again, a modern

Lazarus.

you’re amazed at your good

fortune.

somehow you’ve had more

than your share of second

chances.

hell, accept it.

what you have, you have.

you walk and look in the bathroom

mirror

at an idiot’s smile.

you know your luck.

some go down and never climb back up.

something is being kind to you.

you turn from the mirror and walk into the

world.

you find a chair, sit down, light a cigar.

back from a thousand wars

you look out from an open door into the silent

night.

Sibelius plays on the radio.

nothing has been lost or destroyed.

you blow smoke into the night,

tug at your right

ear.

baby, right now, you’ve got it

all.

two nights before my 72nd birthday

sitting here on a boiling hot night while

drinking a bottle of cabernet sauvignon

after winning $232 at the track.

there’s not much I can tell you except

if it weren’t for my bad right leg

I don’t feel much different than I did

30 or 40 years ago (except that

now I have more money and should be able

to afford a decent

burial). also,

I drive better automobiles and have

stopped carrying a

switchblade.

I am still looking for a hero, a role model,

but can’t find one.

I am no more tolerant of Humanity

than I ever was.

I am not bored with myself and find

that I am the only one I can

turn to in time of

crisis.

I’ve been ready to die for decades and

I’ve been practicing, polishing up

for that end

but it’s very

hot tonight

and I can think of little but

this fine cabernet,

that’s gift enough for me.

sometimes I can’t

believe I’ve come this far,

this has to be some kind of goddamned

miracle!

just another old guy

blinking at the forces,

smiling a little,

as the cities tremble and the left

hand rises,

clutching

something

real.

have we come to this?

Lord, boys,

it’s been a long time since we

sang a happy tune from

deep in the lungs.

somehow we’ve allowed them

to shut off our air, our water, our

electricity, our joy.

we’ve become like them: stilted, exact,

graven,

secretly bitter, smitten by

what’s small.

Lord, boys,

we’ve not been kind enough to hippies and

harpies, to sots and slatterns,

to our brothers and

sisters.

Lord, boys,

where has the heroic self

gone?

it’s gone into hiding, a scattered cat

in a hailstorm!

have we come to this?

have we really come to

this?

as I open my mouth

to sing

a happy tune from

deep in the lungs

a black fly

circles and swoops

in.

Lord!

old poem

what an old poem this is

from an old guy.

you’ve heard it many times

before:

me sitting here

sotted

again.

ashtray full.

bottles about.

poems scattered on the

floor.

as night creeps toward dawn

I make

more and more typing

errors and

the bars closed long

ago.

even the crickets are

asleep.

Li Po must have

experienced all these things

too.

hello, Li Po, you

juicehead, the world is still

full of

rancor and

regret.

you knew what to do

about that:

set fire to the

poems and then

sail them down the river

as the Emperor wept at such

waste

(but you and I

know that waste is a

natural part of the

way).

and the way is

now

and

fortunately

I have one drink

left

there on the floor

among the

poems

as

out of smokes

I poke into the

ashtray

light a butt

burn my nose

singe my

eyebrows

then tap out

another line of

boozy poesy

as I hear a voice

rising from the

neighborhood:

“FUCK YOU AND THAT

MACHINE!”

ah, they’ve been very

patient: it’s 3:45

a.m.

I will now stop

typing and I will

savor this last

drink

because while

I have defeated death

at least

10,000 times

the L.A. police department

is another

matter.

older

I’m older but I don’t mind,

yet.

I feel like a tank

rolling over and through all

the accumulated

crap.

more and more of it

piles up

as time passes,

physical and spiritual

crap.

we’ve even polluted

the stratosphere with

space junk,

with crap,

it floats around up

there.

I remember my grandmother.

she was old.

a mound of useless flesh

with dead eyes,

and a mind stuffed with,

well, crap.

it made me tired and

discouraged to look

at her.

me, I’m still rare meat,

I’ll make a good meal,

the black dogs of death trail me,

nip at my heels.

tiresome hounds, they never

quit.

when they bring me down

they’ll have something

worthy

of their efforts.

young maidens in far-off

countries will

weep,

and rightfully so.

and hell for me will be something interesting and

new.

closing time

around 2 a.m.

in my small room

after turning off the poem

machine

for now

I continue to light

cigarettes and listen to

Beethoven on the

radio.

I listen with a

strange and lazy

aplomb,

knowing there’s still a poem

or two left to write, and

I feel damn

fine, at long

last,

as once again I

admire the verve and gamble

of this composer

now dead for over 100

years,

who’s younger and wilder

than you are

than I am.

the centuries are sprinkled

with rare magic

with divine creatures

who help us get past the common

and

extraordinary ills

that beset us.

I light the next to last

cigarette

remember all the 2 a.m.’s

of my past,

put out of the bars

at closing time,

put out on the streets

(a ragged band of

solitary lonely

humans

we were)

each walking home

alone.

this is much better: living

where I now

live

and listening to

the reassurance

the kindness

of this unexpected

SYMPHONY OF TRIUMPH:

a new life.

no leaders, please

invent yourself and then reinvent yourself,

don’t swim in the same slough.

invent yourself and then reinvent yourself

and

stay out of the clutches of mediocrity.

invent yourself and then reinvent yourself,

change your tone and shape so often that they can

never

categorize you.

reinvigorate yourself and

accept what is

but only on the terms that you have invented

and reinvented.

be self-taught.

and reinvent your life because you must;

it is your life and

its history

and the present

belong only to

you.

everything hurts

when you get as old as I am you can’t help thinking

about death; you know it’s getting closer with every tick of

your watch: an old fart like me can go in a second,

have a stroke, or cancer, or

etc.

etc.

while the young think about locating a piece of ass

the old think about … death.

still,

age makes you appreciate small things:

like, say, you look at a grapefruit like you never

quite looked at one before, or at a bridge, or at a dog or even

just at the sidewalk, you realize you’ve never really seen them clearly

before.

and all the other things around you suddenly seem … new.

the world is now a flower, though sometimes an ugly

one.

and driving the boulevards, you watch people in their

cars and you think: each of them must finally

die.

it’s strange, isn’t it, that each of them must finally die?

then (I often get lucky) I will forget about death. I will

forget that I am … old.

I will feel 45 again. (I’ve always felt 45, even when

I was 16.)

as somewhere somebody waters a small potted plant,

as a plane crashes with a fierce explosion into a mountain,

as deep in the sea strange creatures move,

the poet remains manacled to his helpless

self.

husk

now I watch other men fight

for money and glory

on television

while I sit on an old couch

in the night

a wife and 5 or 6 cats

nearby.

now I sit and watch other men fight

for money and glory.

hell,

I never fought for money.

maybe I should have

but I was never that good

at it—

only sometimes

brave.

is it too late for a comeback?

a comeback from where?

now I sit and watch other men fight

for money and glory.

I sit with a soda and 3 fig bars

as the world curls and goes up in

flame around

me.

my song

ample

consternation,

plentiful

pain

restless days

and

sleepless

nights

always fighting

with all your

heart and soul

so as not

to fail at

living.

who could ask

for anything

more?

cancer

half-past nowhere

alone

in the crumbling

tower of myself

stumbling in this the

darkest

hour

the last gamble has been

lost

as I

reach

for

bone

silence.

blue

blue fish, the blue night, a blue knife—

everything is blue.

and my cats are blue: blue fur, blue claws,

blue whiskers, blue eyes.

my bed lamp shines

blue.

inside, my blue heart pumps blue blood.

my fingernails, my toenails are

blue

and around my bed floats a

blue ghost.

even the taste inside my mouth is

blue.

and I am alone and dying and

blue.

twilight musings

the drifting of the mind.

the slow loss, the leaking away.

one’s demise is not very interesting.

from my bed I watch 3 birds through the east window:

one coal black, one dark brown, the

other yellow.

as night falls I watch the red lights on the bridge blink on and off.

I am stretched out in bed with the covers up to my chin.

I have no idea who won at the racetrack today.

I must go back into the hospital tomorrow.

why me?

why not?

mind and heart

unaccountably we are alone

forever alone

and it was meant to be

that way,

it was never meant

to be any other way—

and when the death struggle

begins

the last thing I wish to see

is

a ring of human faces

hovering over me—

better just my old friends,

the walls of my self,

let only them be there.

I have been alone but seldom

lonely.

I have satisfied my thirst

at the well

of my self

and that wine was good,

the best I ever had,

and tonight

sitting

staring into the dark

I now finally understand

the dark and the

light and everything

in between.

peace of mind and heart

arrives

when we accept what

is:

having been

born into this

strange life

we must accept

the wasted gamble of our

days

and take some satisfaction in

the pleasure of

leaving it all

behind.

cry not for me.

grieve not for me.

read

what I’ve written

then

forget it

all.

drink from the well

of your self

and begin

again.

EXTRACT

FROM CHARLES BUKOWSKI’S

HOLLYWOOD

ALSO AVAILABLE FROM CANONGATE

Bukowski’s alter ego, Henry Chinaski, returns, revelling in his eternal penchant for booze, women and horse-racing as he makes the precarious journey from poet to screenwriter. Based on Bukowski’s experiences when working on the film Barfly, Hollywood is an irreverent roman à clef serving up the beating heart of La-la land with razor-sharp humour.

‘As always there is an unerring accuracy to his insight, and no other book gets as

close to the corrupt heart of American movie-making.’ Guardian

‘Charles Bukowski has written a classic in the take-the-money-and-don’t-run

category of Hollywood fiction. This is the genre wherein Real Writers who have

been seduced into screenwriting (than which nothing is more lowercase) live to tell

all shamelessly.’ New York Times Book Review

£7.99

ISBN 978 1 84195 996 2

CHAPTER ONE

A COUPLE OF days later Pinchot phoned. He said he wanted to go ahead with the screenplay. We should come down and see him?

So we got the directions and were in the Volks and heading for Marina del Rey. Strange territory.

Then we were down at the harbor, driving past the boats. Most of them were sailboats and people were fiddling about on deck. They were dressed in their special sailing clothes, caps, dark shades. Somehow, most of them had apparently escaped the daily grind of living. They had never been caught up in that grind and never would be. Such were the rewards of the Chosen in the land of the free. After a fashion, those people looked silly to me. And, of course, I wasn’t even in their thoughts.

We turned right, down from the docks and went past streets laid out in alphabetical order, with fancy names. We found the street, turned left, found the number, pulled into the driveway. The sand came right up to us and the ocean was close enough to be seen and far enough away to be safe. The sand seemed cleaner than other sand and the water seemed bluer and the breeze seemed kinder.

‘Look,’ I said to Sarah, ‘we have just landed upon the outpost of death. My soul is puking.’

‘Will you stop worrying about your soul?’ Sarah responded.

No need to lock the Volks. I was the only one who could start it.

We were at the door. I knocked.

It opened to this tall slim delicate type, you smelled artistry all over him. You could see he had been born to Create, to Create grand things, totally unhindered, never bothered by such petty things as toothache, self-doubt, lousy luck. He was one of those who looked like a genius. I looked like a dishwasher so these types always pissed me just a bit.

‘We’re here to pick up the dirty laundry,’ I said.

‘Ignore him,’ Sarah interspersed. ‘Pinchot suggested we come by.’

‘Ewe,’ said the gentleman, ‘do come in …’

We followed him and his little rabbit cheeks. He stopped then, at some special edge, he was charming, and he spoke over his left shoulder as if the entire world were listening to his delicate proclamation:

‘I go get my VOD-KA now!’

He flashed off into the kitchen.

‘Jon mentioned him the other night,’ said Sarah. ‘He is Paul Renoir. He writes operas and is also working in a form known as the Opera-Movie. Very avant-garde.’

‘He may be a great man but I don’t want him sucking at my ear lobes.’

‘Oh, stop being so defensive! Everybody can’t be like you!’

‘I know. That’s their problem.’

‘Your greatest strength,’ said Sarah, ‘is that you fear everything.’

‘I wish I had said that.’

Paul walked back with his drink. It looked good. There was even a bit of lime in there and he stirred it with a little glass stick. A swizzle. Real class.

‘Paul,’ I asked, ‘is there anything else to drink in there?’

‘Ewe, sorry,’ he said, ‘please do help yourself!’

I charged into the kitchen right upon the heels of Sarah. There were bottles everywhere. While we were deciding, I cracked a beer.

‘We better lay off the hard stuff,’ suggested my good lady. ‘You know how you get when you’re drinking that.’

‘Right. Let’s go with the wine.’

I found a corkscrew and got a bottle of fine-looking red.

We each had a good hit. Then we refilled our glasses and walked out. At one time I used to refer to Sarah and me as Zelda and Scott, but that bothered her because she didn’t like the way Zelda had ended up. And I didn’t like what Scott had typed. So, we had abandoned our sense of humor there.

Paul Renoir was at the large picture window checking out the Pacific.

‘Jon is late,’ he said to the picture window and the ocean, ‘but he told me to tell you that he will be right along and to please stay.’

‘O.K., baby …’

Sarah and I sat down with our drinks. We faced the rabbit cheeks. He faced the sea. He appeared to be musing.

‘Chinaski,’ he said, ‘I have read much of your work. It is wild shit. You are very good …’

‘Thank you. But we know who is really the best. You’re the best.’

‘Ewe,’ he said as he continued to face the sea, ‘it is very very nice of you to … realize that …’

The door opened and a young girl with long black hair walked in without knocking. Next thing we knew she was stretched out up on the back of the sofa, lengthwise, like a cat.

‘I’m Popppy,’ she said, ‘with 4 “p”s.’

I had a relapse: ‘We’re Scott and Zelda.’

‘Cut the shit!’ said Sarah.

I gave our proper names.

Paul turned from the sea.

‘Popppy is one of the backers of your screenplay.’

‘I haven’t written a word,’ I said.

‘You will …’

‘Would you, please?’ I looked at Sarah and held up my empty glass.

Sarah was a good girl. She left with the glass. She knew that if I went in there I would start in on sundry bottles and then start in on my way to being nasty.

I would learn later that another name for Popppy was ‘The Princess from Brazil’. And for starters she had kicked in ten grand. Not much. But it paid for some of the rent and some of the drinks.

The Princess looked at me from her cat-like position on the back of the couch.

‘I’ve read your stuff. You’re very funny.’

‘Thank you.’

Then I looked over at Paul. ‘Hey, baby, did you hear that? I’m funny!’

‘You deserve,’ he said, ‘a certain place …’

He flashed toward the kitchen again as Sarah passed him with our refills. She sat down next to me and I had a hit.

The thought then occurred to me that I could just bluff the screenplay and sit around Marina del Rey for months sucking up drinks. Before I could really savor that thought, the door burst open and there was Jon Pinchot.

‘Ah, you came by!’

‘Ewe,’ I said.

‘I think I have a backer! All you have to do is write it.’

‘It might take a few months.’

‘But, of course …’

Then Paul was back. He had a strange pink-looking drink for the Princess.

Pinchot flashed toward the kitchen for one of his own.

It was the first of many meetings which would simply dissolve into bouts of heavy drinking, especially on my part. I found it to be a needed build-up for my confidence as I was really only interested in the poem and the short story. Writing a screenplay seemed to me an ultimately stupid thing to do. But better men than I had been trapped into such a ridiculous act.

Jon Pinchot came out with his drink, sat down.

It became a long night. We talked and talked, about what I was not sure. Finally both Sarah and I had drunk too much to be able to drive back. We were kindly offered a bedroom.

It was in that bedroom, in the dark, as we poured a last good red wine, Sarah asked me, ‘You going to write a screenplay?’

‘Hell no,’ I answered.

also by charles bukowski

Flower, Fist and Bestial Wail (1960)

Longshot Pomes for Broke Players (1962)

Run with the Hunted (1962)

It Catches My Heart In Its Hands (1963)

Crucifix in a Deathhand (1965)

Cold Dogs in the Courtyard (1965)

Confessions of a Man Insane Enough to Live with Beasts (1965)

All the Assholes in the World and Mine (1966)

At Terror Street and Agony Way (1968)

Poems Written Before Jumping Out of an 8 Story Window (1968)

Notes of a Dirty Old Man (1969)

The Days Run Away Like Wild Horses Over the Hills (1969)

Fire Station (1970)

Post Office (1971)

Mockingbird Wish Me Luck (1972)

Erections, Ejaculations, Exhibitions and General Tales of Ordinary Madness (1972)

South of No North (1973)

Burning in Water, Drowning in Flame: Selected Poems 1955–1973 (1974)

Factotum (1975)

Love is a Dog from Hell: Poems 1974–1977 (1977)

Women (1978)

Play the Piano Drunk / Like a Percussion Instrument / Until the Fingers Begin to Bleed a Bit (1979)

Dangling in the Tournefortia (1981)

Ham on Rye (1982)

Bring Me Your Love (1983)

Hot Water Music (1983)

There’s No Business (1984)

War All the Time: Poems 1981–1984 (1984)

You Get So Alone at Times that It Just Makes Sense (1986)

The Movie: ‘Barfly’ (1987)

The Roominghouse Madrigals: Early Selected Poems 1946–1966 (1988)

Hollywood (1989)

Septuagenarian Stew: Stories & Poems (1990)

The Last Night of the Earth Poems (1992)

Run with the Hunted: A Charles Bukowski Reader (1993)

Screams from the Balcony: Selected Letters 1960–1970 (1993)

Pulp (1994)

Shakespeare Never Did This (augmented edition) (1995)

Living on Luck: Selected Letters 1960s–1970s, Volume 2 (1995)

Betting on the Muse: Poems & Stories (1996)

Bone Palace Ballet: New Poems (1997)

The Captain is Out to Lunch and the Sailors Have Taken Over the Ship (1998)

Reach for the Sun: Selected Letters 1978–1994 (1999)

What Matters Most Is How Well You Walk Through the Fire: New Poems (1999)

Open All Night: New Poems (2000)

Night Torn Mad with Footsteps: New Poems (2001)

Beerspit Night and Cursing: The Correspondence of Charles Bukowski and Sheri Martinelli, 1960–1967 (2001)

sifting through the madness of the world, the line, the way: new poems (2003)

The Flash of Lightning Behind the Mountain (2004)

Slouching Toward Nirvana (2005)

Copyright

First published in the United States of America in 2006 by Ecco,

an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, 10 East 53rd Street,

New York, NY 10022

Published in Great Britain in 2008 by Canongate Books Ltd,

14 High Street, Edinburgh EH1 1TE

This digital edition published in 2009 by Canongate Books

Copyright © Linda Lee Bukowski, 2006

The moral right of the author has been asserted

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available on request from the British Library

ISBN 978 1 84767 673 3

www.meetatthegate.com