Screams From the Balcony

by Charles Bukowski

  meanwhile Postoffice has found out I do this weekly column “Notes of a Dirty Old Man” for the local underground paper Open City and they look upon it most darkly, they seem to think that some of the work is dirty and really not up to what a postal clerk should be doing in his spare time. I have had 2 long interviews with the big boys in long dark rooms and we have sparred back and forth, quietly, neither side giving ground. but, meanwhile, I am still employed and I still continue to write the column. which some smut peddler in North Hollywood wants to put out in book form but I just can’t seem to get out to see him—although Bryan says he is good for $1,000 advance, I am still FROZEN. I get smut-peddlar on phone, we talk, I say, “soon soon,” and he says, “fine, fine,” but I just can’t seem to get out there. really FROZEN, Carl. can you understand? it’s crazy. people want to do good by me and I won’t let them. I guess I’m just tired. too much going on. and I look down at floor as I type this to you and here is this package, still there, looking up at me with its eyeless face, waiting to be mailed to England. ah, England, my England! oh yes, and PENGUIN wants to send me advance royalty check on the Lamantia-Norse-Bukowski thing but they also send these papers that must be filled out FIRST, something about the United Kingdom, I must declare that I am not a member of the United Kingdom or something, 2 or 3 pages, horrible, I can’t get a pen to damned page, and when I do I have to find a Notary Public, some dame will hike her skirt and I will get a hard-on and she will charge me $5 and place a red seal upon the last page of the blue paper if I EVER FILL IT OUT! paper, papers, I’ve lost my social security card, can’t get my new registration card into folder on steering wheel of my 57 Plymouth, have lost my state income tax card, new papers to be filled out for govt. partly-sponsored life insurance on job they are trying to kick me out of, 8 or 10 pages, the landlady wants to come in here and put up new curtains, I say, “wait, wait, there are dead bodies in there, I don’t want you to see all the dead bodies.” she laughs, but even she and her husband fuck me up; I just about get straight and she comes on down here and knocks on the door and gets me to come down and they both get me drunk, we sit up all nights singing very silly songs, and I can’t get anywhere. [* * *]

  * * *

  Statement was a pamphlet / manifesto by Robert Kelly, published by Black Sparrow Press in April, 1968.

  [To John Martin]

  Monday in [April?] 1968

  thanks for mailing Statement but I can’t understand this kind of writing, but granted, it does take talent to write 8 or 10 pages and say absolutely nothing, and it’s safe too. At first I thought it was Robert Creeley but, no, I see Robert Kelly. I’m afraid you’ve been sucked in by the poetry nestlings who pluck each other’s feathers. but if you can make money off them, fine. [* * *]

  * * *

  [To Carl Weissner]

  Early May 1968

  [* * *] god yes! would you do the selections and (I hope) translations on my poems for Verlag kiepenheuer & witsch? got a good letter from R. R. Rygulla. if you could do the dirty work for me, it would help. I am up to my ass. take any poems you wish. I needn’t even know. tell Rygulla I said o.k. you don’t know how much I appreciate. like I say, up to my ass. just now, I have been doing paintings in the kitchen. this bird, Martin, wants 75 small paintings which will be mounted in the backs of special hardbound copies of Terror Street. I’ve made around 60 paintings up to now he wants 20 more. give me 20 more, he says, and I’ll pick them up Monday. I’ve done 6. these editors just don’t realize that paintings just can’t be made up, oh splash splash the merry brush—each painting must come from the balls like a fuck. few men can fuck 6 times a night. 20 is just impossible. [* * *]

  * * *

  [To Jon and Louise Webb]

  May 16, 1968

  [* * *] I have been writing 6 columns a month, 4 for Bryan and 2 for The Underground Review (New York). I am going to tell each of these guy “one a month” and if they don’t want that, let them shove it. mostly I am disgusted with the contents of their papers. very high school stuff. plus 6 columns a month gives me no time to fiddle with my precious poems, esp. feeling as weak and down as I do now. [* * *]

  * * *

  [To John Martin]

  May 29, 1968

  rec. your beautiful check and the 20 copies Terror Street. hey, boss, no royalties on the tape? but we workers always complaining! check much more than I expected, and I hope you don’t get stuck with a closetful of Terror Streets.

  yes, would like to do another book with you—the new poems-will keep carbons of all the shit I write from now on. plus, there is plenty of back work. I must somehow shake Webb, who’s a good man and has done well by my work, but the no royalties thing is the setback—I’m only human, after all, my friend. but let’s let him bring out the poems he has in the present Patchen Outsider before I tell him. I don’t have copies of the poems but believe they are rather good ones, so best to let the Outsider run them so we can get our hands on them. I don’t want Webb to have an emotional disturbance.

  drop me a note now and then telling me how things are going. I believe that you have published more poets in a shorter time than anybody in history—and have done it neatly. most of us now running around with our little Black Sparrow tatoos. the action is good and the money ain’t bad. tanks, kid. [* * *]

  * * *

  [To Carl Weissner]

  sometime May 1968

  [* * *] the Bukowski/Richmond LP not so hot, except I think I managed to get off the poem “Experience” o.k. the Martin tape is the one—all else compared to it is nothing. you will SEE, hear, if you EVER get it out of Martin. I even like it myself, brother, caught myself on a good night, no poetic bullshit, just a natural speak-piece. try to get his tape; you will punch your balls out against some side cupboards. I promise. but try to get the full tape, instead of the selected retail tape. the full one is a 7 inch spool both sides, 3 and ¾s I think. Martin left out some good ones, “The Body” being the main omission and the best reading on tape. beast reading, rather. [* * *]

  * * *

  [To Jon and Louise Webb]

  June 4, 1968

  [* * *] got $460 royalties from John Martin for Terror Street and it just about saved me from going under. my checks from god damn p.o. have been very small due to sickness—I owed them 192 hours sick leave. now Martin wants to do my next book of new poetry and I think I’ll have to let him. the money may damn well keep me off the row or out of the cemetery. I hope you understand. I know that your plans for another book were rather indefinite. you’ve done more to promote my work than anybody, of course, now I hope you’ll be kind enough to understand that the body needs help too. I mean this sickness thing. so let’s let Martin do my next book, o.k.? and I hope that you don’t get pissed and we have to go into one of our long dark silences. as crappy as I feel that wouldn’t help much. [* * *]

  * * *

  [To Jon and Louise Webb]

  June 15, 1968

  [* * *] guy wrote me the other day about an old review Rexroth did of me. I never saw it. something like, “Bukowski a great writer? nope. a pretty book…” he drags in Hemingway on me and then says that as a bum I know my business but that Ernie mingled with Artists and writers of his time, kicked around the continents…maybe you saw it and never showed it to me. a pretty book? why, that sunken-jawed subnormal! it would have been a GREAT book with Rexy in it, what? these boys can really get catty and jealous as old maids. as for being a Hemingway, I don’t want to be a Hemingway. and to mix with the writers and artists of my Time, uhhh uh. leave me alone. I’m crazy enough already. and if I am a bum and not literary then thank all the purple and green and golden Christs of my

  Valhalla. [* * *]

  I am at work the other day, hungover, beat, tired, sick, numb, dirty, done. this kid walks up to me. “Pardon me, sir.”

  “yeah?”

  “are you Charles Bukowski?”

  “yeah.”

  “we’re studying you in American Literature at college.”

/>   “umm.”

  “I recognized you from your photo. it was in our school paper.”

  “oh yeah?”

  “I’ve tried to get some of your books at the library but you’re rather…restricted.”

  I laughed. “‘restricted.’ that’s a nice word.”

  I got rid of him. ridiculous. everything is ridiculous. I am dying.

  he came back a week later. “hello, Charles.”

  “hello, kid.”

  “what do you think of the Kennedy assassination?”

  “I wrote something for this week’s Open City. fifteen cents will get you the lowdown.”

  “all right.”

  …I am drinking a coffee. as I get up to walk away I hear him tell his young buddies—“see that guy? he’s a great writer…”

  “aw, come on, Bob!”

  “yes, yes, it’s TRUE!”…

  well, you see now, all I have to do is lean back and take the applause. life is getting easier all the time. [* * *]

  I’ve got a whole potful of poems to send out but can’t get to them. I mean, those you’ve returned. in my old age, I do re-work. I mean, I knock out bad lines, throw in one or 2 new ones and sometimes I’ve got a poem. I don’t think it’s cheating. it’s more an instinctive thing. I just can’t bear some of those lines anymore. [* * *]

  * * *

  [To Jim Roman]

  June 20, 1968

  long time & sorry, but been going through same type fire & death all men go thru & it has sawed me off a bit.

  I see same results with fellow-poets who have not made it $$-wise or fame-wise

  & results are terrible:

  crack-brain

  bitter men

  raving—

  me, I have rested quietly (if you can call 8 or 10 hours a day sticking their fucking letters, as such…) and simply waiting on the word—

  of course, all the time, wonder if death should come at my call or its call. umm.

  Our Corrington now teaching at Berk., U.C., and don’t give up on him. His warmth is 2-bit whore but his style is classic & history bugs his brain. still I like him. [* * *]

  * * *

  [To Frances Smith]

  July 1968

  I know you worked hard with these god damned things, maybe too hard, and a lot of aces seem to go down each time we fail, or fail for somebody, but since I am playing God-editor and have been rejected more than accepted—

  “a little rejection is good for the soul;

  total rejections can kill a man…”

  bukowski over a beer at the midnight

  sun, Albuquerque, 1945…

  I think I had better tell you

  since nobody at the Bridge is really going to tell you

  the Truth is only my Truth

  and I know you are touchy, very…

  but I think you would have been more hurt if I had handed these back with some cliché and a wave of paper—

  well, shit, nothing’s easy and poems are the hardest

  but poems can be easiest too if we start conning ourselves, and

  there is little doubt that most people

  probably including myself

  would have made better Presbyterian preachers,

  so that’s a lock and rock

  so now listen

  since the Bridge ain’t gona tell you

  maybe I got to save your buttersoft ass, ha,

  stop twitching, bitch,

  I’ve seen that hair and tooth too much too long over

  too many breakfast tables

  through my hangover skull, and believe me,

  I’d rather see you write an immortal poem than strike out;

  I am not your enemy but neither can I feed you bullshit…

  [* * *]

  * * *

  [To Steven Richmond]

  July 23, 1968

  [* * *] by the way, Bryan wants me to edit the next literary insert (Renaissance) of Open City and I said, “all right.” I can see why he didn’t want the job. he had a bucketful of half-ass submissions. so now I am in the process of writing various people in order to get good stuff. because if I am going to edit a section it is going to be stone-pure hard, but I’ve found out the difference between wanting to print good stuff and printing it. [* * *] I’d much rather accept than reject, but once you accept one bad piece because you drank a beer with a guy or you liked his stuff in the old Ole, what the hell, you are going to accept more and more bad stuff until it’s all bad, what I mean by bad stuff is, bad for me. that’s all I judge by. [* * *]

  * * *

  [To Steven Richmond]

  July 25, 1968

  hookay, kid, you made it with three [* * *] which is more poems than I have accepted from anybody yet. [* * *]

  got a couple of bitchy little notes in mail today. the boys don’t like to be rejected, especially after I ask to see their work. I find, tho, that this is the danger of these guys printing each other in their little mimeos and reading to each other before the lesbians and homos: they get deluded into thinking that they are doing something. are something. it’s only a sucking-out of each other’s assholes. guys like D. R. Wagner, Ritch Kretch, Charles Potts, so forth, can’t write but they go on and on writing so long as the mimeo machines can get ink and paper. I pick up the average little and just yawn myself into hopelessness—there are exceptions like Wormwood, Klacto, Outsider, but for each of these there are a dozen others, half-heartedly done, self-important and about as real and interesting as Brenda Starr in the L.A. Times.

  I don’t write too much anymore but when I do I get rejected enough and when I get rejected I usually find, after reading the poem, that the editor in one way or another was right. and instead of writing a solemn and bitchy note I sit down and carve me out another poem.[* * *]

  * * *

  [To Douglas Blazek]

  July 1968

  [* * *] your stuff is still warm toast with butter and the children sitting quietly by the window and the first HOT coffee against the hangover; you’ve got this spilled-over and unpretentious earnestness in a way that none of the other poets have…a Blazek is a Blazek. but after saying all that, I am only taking 2 poems because I look forward to a definite space limitation with this damned thing, and so even with the stuff I like I have to keep it down to the bone; which, in a sense is good because it forces me to choose the finest from among the fine. so, therefore, the other poems back…no 2 and ½ year hold. [* * *]

  but I still like poetry, any gathering of poetry, hung in between a bit of prose and prose shouting—the prose like kind of lumps of crazy mountain and the poems like m.g. shots vip vip vip vip!!! and I’m going to have more of a problem getting the prose I want. why don’t you write me a kind of essay on poetics, what’s wrong with poetics, generally, and what a man really NEEDS…you know, when he comes home after they’ve clubbed him to death, after he comes home with his 3 or 4 greasy pennies of pay and there is the old lady with hair uncombed, yellow teeth, on the phone, running up the phone bill with insane and unreal woman talk; the kids glad to see you—but just for a moment—like a new toy—and you know you ain’t you, you’re just a dirty dishrag or gum under the seat, you’re just stale piss clubbed with a flyswatter. then tell what KIND of poetry is needed and why Creeley, so forth, are the palest and most tortuous of atrocities. something like that. would be good. [* * *]

  * * *

  [To Steven Richmond]

  [Fall, 1968]

  the 100 pager isn’t doing. I’m frozen at 28 poems. can’t find another in the universe [* * *]

  poems printed in Ren. all selected by me, except the DiPrima’s, which are bad writing. D.P. can’t write. maybe that’s why she gets a yearly grant from the HUMANITIES (govt. sponsored). Bryan slipped the DiPrims in on me. and didn’t run all the poems I had accepted. [* * *]

  * * *

  [To Douglas Blazek]

  September 23, 1968

  some university is offering me $$$$$ for a collection of my materi
als, and the more I can give them, natch, the more I will be able to make.

  my thought was that collection of letters you (and Veryl) had gathered. I wonder if there is any chance of getting hold of these, preferably in the original but also photoed if not in the original? the better I offer these boys the more they are going to give me and it might help me get out of the bloody post office at last, what with the PENGUIN book coming up and a few other things.[* * *]

  * * *

  [To Carl Weissner]

  [October 14, 1968]

  well, I have some dribbling shit for you, it may make you unhappy, it has made me unhappy the way it has worked—let me get this untwisted here. some univ. library, with the stuff I have on hand-notebooks, typescripts, extra books of my poetry, my paintings, all that gobble, well, I am getting a nice offer from them—enough money to set me free for one or two years, just to write and lay in the sun—and I get an idea if I get this shot my luck will continue—just got the first advance on a book of prose Notes of a Dirty Old Man—but the univ. library thing also hinges on my getting quite a few letters, plenty of them BACK from people I have written to.