like high heels, breasts,
singing, the
works.
(don’t get me wrong,
there is such a thing as
a cockeyed optimism
that overlooks all
basic problems just for
the sake of
itself—
this is a shield and a
sickness.)
the knife got near my
throat again,
I almost turned on the
gas
again
but when the good
moments arrived
again
I didn’t fight them off
like an alley
adversary.
I let them take me,
I luxuriated in them,
I bade them welcome
home.
I even looked into
the mirror
once having thought
myself to be
ugly,
I now liked what
I saw, almost
handsome, yes,
a bit ripped and
ragged,
scars, lumps,
odd turns,
but all in all,
not too bad,
almost handsome,
better at least than
some of those movie
star faces
like the cheeks of
a baby’s
butt.
and finally I discovered
real feelings for
others,
unheralded,
like lately,
like this morning,
as I was leaving
for the track,
I saw my wife in bed,
just the shape of
her head there, covers
pulled high, just the
shape of her
head there
(not forgetting
centuries of the living
and the dead and
the dying,
the pyramids,
Mozart dead
but his music still
there in the
room, weeds growing,
the earth turning,
the toteboard waiting for
me)
I saw the shape of my
wife’s head,
she so still,
I ached for her life,
just being there
under the
covers.
I kissed her on the
forehead,
got down the stairway,
got outside,
got into my marvelous
car,
fixed the seatbelt,
backed out the
drive.
feeling warm to
the fingertips,
down to my
foot on the gas
pedal,
I entered the world
once
more,
drove down the
hill
past the houses
full and empty
of
people,
I saw the mailman,
honked,
he waved
back
at
me.
the 13th month
in the November of our hell
the birds still fly
or are murdered by the
cats.
in the November of our hell
the boxers hear the bell
and rise to do
what they must do.
in the November of our hell
in the November of our hell,
December
approaches.
in the November of our hell
I walk down the stairway
an old man now.
I reach the bottom,
walk outside
into a world millions of
years old,
I bend down to pet my cat,
his eyes look into mine
and past the
sun
in the November of our hell,
December coming
for both of us
for all of us.
I leave the cat,
climb into my automobile,
the engine starts,
I go out the driveway
backing carefully,
swing into the street
toward the mass of the
living
in the November of their hell,
December coming,
December coming,
look, look, look,
such effrontery!
can you believe it?
and after December?
what month?
what time?
what?
finis, II
we all falter, give way, want to
toss it in.
the bad days come.
the bad days come more often.
we sit and wait, thinking, it will
pass.
but the day will come when it
will not pass.
it will stay.
you will sit in a garden chair
breathing the thick
air.
and an old cat will come and
lay at your feet.
he will wait with you.
death comes slowly some
times.
sometimes much too
slowly.
you will reach down and
pet the cat.
thinking again of the mad and
drunken
years.
the observer
every time I drove past the hospital
I looked at it and thought, some day
I’ll be in there.
and eventually I was in there,
sometimes sitting at this long
narrow window
and watching the cars pass on the
street below, as I once had
done.
it was a stupid window,
I had to sit on two folded blankets so that
I could see out.
they had built the window so that part of
the wooden frame
was eye-height
so you either had to look over or
under it.
so I sat on the blankets and looked
over.
well, the window wasn’t stupid,
the designers
were.
so I sat there and watched the cars
pass on the street and I thought,
those lucky sons of bitches don’t
know how lucky they
are
just to be dumb and driving through
the air
while I sit here on top of my
years
trapped,
nothing but a face in the window
that nobody ever
saw.
August, 1993
easy, go easy, you can’t outlast the mountain,
you’ve just come back from another
war,
go easy.
they are clamoring for you to do it for them once
again,
let them wait.
sit in the shade, wait for your strength to
return.
you’ll know when the time is here.
then you’ll arrive
for yourself and for them.
a bright sun.
a new fire.
a new gamble.
but
for now
go easy.
let them wait.
let them watch the new boys, the old
boys
meanwhile, you’ll need a day or two
to sharpen the
soul,
musing through these D. H. Lawrence
afternoons,
those horseless da
ys,
these nights of music trickling from the
walls,
this waiting for the fullness and the
charge.
this night
I sit in a chair on the balcony
and drink natural spring
water.
the large palms run down the
hill with their dark
heads.
I can see the lights of this
city, of several
cities.
I sit in this balcony chair
where a high voltage wire runs
down and connects underneath
here
where I can reach out and
touch it.
(we can go very fast around
here.)
I hold a bottle of natural
spring water.
a plane flies high in the
overcast, I can’t see him,
he can’t see
me.
he is very fast.
I can’t catch him but I can
pass him by
stretching out
my hand.
it’s a cool summer night.
hell trembles nearby,
stretches.
I sit in this chair.
my 6 cats are
close by.
I lift the bottle of water,
take a large
swallow.
things will be far worse than
they are
now.
and far
better.
I wait.
betting on now
I am old enough to have died several
times and I almost have,
now I drive my car through the sun
and over the freeway and past
Watts and to the racetrack
where the parking lot attendants
and the betting clerks
throw garlands of flowers at
me.
I’ve reached the pause before the full
stop and they are celebrating
because it just seems proper.
what the hell.
the hair I’ve lost to chemotherapy
is slowly growing
back but my feet are numb
and I must concentrate on my
balance.
old and battered, olden
matter,
I am still lucky with the
horses.
the consensus is that I
have a few seasons
left.
you would never believe
that I was once young
with a narrow razor face
and crazy eyes of
gloom.
no matter, I sit at my
table
joking with the waiters.
we know it’s a fixed
game.
it’s funny, Christ, look
at us:
sitting ducks.
“what are you having?”
asks my waiter.
“oh,” I say and
read him something
from the menu.
“o.k.,” he says
and walks away
between the earthquake,
the volcano and the
leopard.
decline
sitting naked behind the house,
8 a.m., spreading sesame seed oil
over my body, jesus, have I come
to this?
I once battled in dark alleys for a
laugh,
now I’m not laughing.
I splash myself with oil and wonder,
how many years do you want?
how many days?
my blood is soiled and a dark
angel sits in my brain.
things are made of something and
go to nothing.
I understand the fall of cities, of
nations.
a small plane passes overhead.
I look upward as if it made sense to
look upward.
it’s true, the sky has rotted:
it won’t be long for any of
us.
in the mouth of the tiger
the rivers of hell are well
peopled with the living.
this is what I write tonight,
a metallic taste in my mouth,
my wife and 6 cats in this
house, I am so sorry for them
because I am not bright with
life for them.
I had no idea that all this
would come so slowly,
running up from my feet
to my brain,
no trumpets blaring
here, no flags of
victory.
I can’t even find the
courage to accept my
fate.
I once felt myself greater
than any trap.
nobody is.
damn it, where has the
music gone?
and myself?
pale as mountain light.
damn it, why?
I would have nobody be
me
now.
the laughing heart
your life is your life.
don’t let it be clubbed into dank
submission.
be on the watch.
there are ways out.
there is light somewhere.
it may not be much light but
it beats the
darkness.
be on the watch.
the gods will offer you
chances.
know them, take them.
you can’t beat death but
you can beat death
in life,
sometimes.
and the more often you
learn to do it,
the more light there will
be.
your life is your life.
know it while you have
it.
you are marvelous
the gods wait to delight
in
you.
a challenge to the dark
shot in the eye
shot in the brain
shot in the ass
shot like a flower in the dance
amazing how death wins hands down
amazing how much credence is given to idiot forms of
life
amazing how laughter has been drowned out
amazing how viciousness is such a constant
I must soon declare my own war on their war
I must hold to my last piece of ground
I must protect the small space I have made that has
allowed me life
my life not their death
my death not their death
this place, this time, now
I vow to the sun
that I will laugh the good laugh once again
in the perfect place of me
forever.
their death not my life.
so now?
the words have come and gone,
I sit ill.
the phone rings, the cats sleep.
Linda vacuums.
I am waiting to live,
waiting to die.
I wish I could ring in some bravery.
it’s a lousy fix
but the tree outside doesn’t know:
I watch it moving with the wind
in the late afternoon sun.
there’s nothing to declare here,
just a waiting.
each faces it alone.
Oh, I was once young,
Oh, I was once unbelievably
young!
About the Author
CHARLES BUKOWSKI is one of America’s best-known contemporary writers of poetry and prose and, many would claim, its most influential and imitated poet. He was born in Andernach
, Germany to an American soldier father and a German mother in 1920, and brought to the United States at the age of three. He was raised in Los Angeles and lived there for fifty years. He published his first story in 1944 when he was twenty-four and began writing poetry at the age of thirty-five. He died in San Pedro, California on March 9, 1994 at the age of seventy-three, shortly after completing his last novel, Pulp (1994).
During his lifetime he published more than forty-five books of poetry and prose, including the novels Post Office (1971), Factotum (1975), Women (1978), Ham on Rye (1982), and Hollywood (1989). His most recent books are the posthumous editions of What Matters Most Is How Well You Walk Through the Fire (1999), Open All Night: New Poems (2000), Beerspit Night and Cursing: The Correspondence of Charles Bukowski & Sheri Martinelli, 1960-1967 (2001) and The Night Torn Mad with Footsteps: New Poems (2001).
All of his books have now been published in translation in over a dozen languages and his worldwide popularity remains undiminished. In the years to come Black Sparrow will publish additional volumes of previously uncollected poetry and letters.
Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.
also by CHARLES BUKOWSKI
The Days Run Away Like Wild Horses Over the Hills (1969)
Post Office (1971)
Mockingbird Wish Me Luck (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)
You Kissed Lily (1978)
Play the Piano drunk Like a percussion instrument Until the fingers begin to bleed a bit (1979)
Shakespeare Never Did This (1979)
Dangling in the Tournefortia (1981)
Ham on Rye (1982)
Bring Me Your Love (1983)
Hot Water Music (1983)
There’s No Business (1984)
Betting on the Muse Page 23
