New Poems Book Three

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by Charles Bukowski

to do with

  anything.

  especially with writing.

  but people keep asking foolish

  questions,

  don’t

  they?

  BORN AGAIN

  this special place of ourselves

  sometimes explodes in our

  faces.

  I got a flat on the freeway yesterday,

  changed the right rear wheel on the

  shoulder,

  the big rigs storming by,

  slamming the sky

  against my head and

  body.

  it felt like I was clinging to the

  edge of the earth,

  30 minutes late for the first

  post.

  but strangely, something

  about the experience

  was very much like emerging reluctantly

  a second time

  from my

  mother’s womb.

  CARD GIRLS

  at the prizefights

  between each round a card girl

  climbs up into the ring

  holding up a card to

  indicate the number of the next

  round.

  the yowling of the men is

  hardly to be

  believed.

  here were brave fighters

  putting their lives and guts

  on the line

  and the crowd responds much more

  enthusiastically

  to female

  ass.

  why not give the crowd just one

  card girl after another and

  forget all about the fighters?

  then those men could simply sit and

  fantasize about having one

  of those card girls

  all to himself

  in his bedroom.

  he then would not have

  to deal with such things

  as PMS, relatives, self-love,

  ambition, the fact that she

  was only a bundle of intestine and

  other sundry parts, or remember that

  card girls must be faithfully and

  continually adored

  for the beauty they had never

  earned.

  yes, give them each a card girl

  forever shaking her butt,

  each man with a card girl

  in his bedroom forever

  fucking her forever

  bang bang bang

  nothing but that—

  no fights, no farts, no

  dark nights, no cousins, no mothers,

  no other lovers, no pregnancies, no

  madness while gradually growing

  old, no toothaches, no snoring,

  no dull endless tv nights,

  just one perfect card girl for each

  man,

  bang, bang, bang,

  sperm and endless desire and the dream

  forever, one card girl for each

  horny man, forget the fighters,

  forget everything

  else!

  yeah.

  I left while the last fight

  was still in progress,

  the 6 card girls

  sitting in their folding

  chairs, their faces

  somehow looking

  more beautiful than ever

  but

  mirroring a horror to

  come.

  outside as I moved to

  my car

  the night was clear and crisp and

  real.

  well, I thought, maybe you’re

  just too old to understand.

  I smiled at that as I slid

  my key into

  the car

  door.

  IT’S NEVER BEEN SO GOOD

  it isn’t mentioned

  too often

  but in the old West

  many men were simply shot in

  the back.

  this matter of bravely facing

  each other

  in the street

  and drawing their guns

  was

  rare.

  the best shooter was

  usually

  the one who

  pulled his gun and

  fired first

  while the other was

  having a drink

  or eating

  or playing cards

  or bedded down with

  a lady

  or

  otherwise

  occupied.

  “dead men don’t talk,”

  they used to

  say.

  in the new West

  things haven’t changed

  at all

  just the weaponry:

  now they can get in 17 or 18

  or

  more

  shots in the back

  quicker than you can say

  holy

  shit.

  GOADING THE MUSE

  this man used to be an

  interesting writer,

  he was able to say brisk and

  refreshing things.

  at the time

  I suggested to the editors and

  the critics that he was one to

  be watched

  and also that he had hardly yet been

  noticed

  and that he certainly should now be

  noticed.

  this writer used some of my

  remarks as blurbs for his

  books, which I didn’t

  mind.

  all of his publications were little

  chapbooks, 16 to 32

  pages,

  mimeographed.

  they came out at a

  rapid rate,

  perhaps three or four a

  year.

  the problem was that each

  chapbook seemed a little weaker

  than the one that preceded

  it

  but he continued to use my old

  blurbs.

  my wife noticed the change

  in his writing

  too.

  “what’s happened to his

  writing?” she asked me.

  “he’s doing too much of it, he’s

  pushing it out, forcing it.”

  “this stuff is bad, you ought to

  tell him to stop using your

  blurbs.”

  “I can’t do that, I just wish he

  wouldn’t publish so much.”

  “well, you publish all the

  time too.”

  “with me,” I told her, “it’s

  different.”

  yesterday I received another of his

  little chapbooks

  with his delicate dedication scrawled

  on the title page.

  this latest effort was totally

  flat.

  the words just fell off the

  page,

  dead on

  arrival.

  where had he gone?

  too much ambition?

  too much just doing it for the sake

  of doing it?

  just not waiting for the words to

  pile up inside and then

  explode of their own

  volition?

  I decided then I should take a whole week

  off,

  be on the safe side,

  just shut the computer down,

  forget the whole damned silly

  business

  for awhile.

  as I said, that was

  yesterday.

  THE WAVERING LINE

  I don’t know where they come from,

  the veterans’ home probably.

  they’re old, mostly bald, tanned, macho but

  somehow sexless.

  the sex drive is no longer a part

  of the equation as

  they sit at the track in the sun,

  arguing abo
ut their bets, talking and

  laughing.

  sometimes between races they

  discuss sports: which is the best?

  the best baseball team? the best

  hockey team? the best basketball or

  football team? amateurs and

  professionals are discussed, and then

  who’s the best player at each

  position?

  they often become angry and shout

  at one another.

  they wear tired clothing, greys and

  browns, they wear heavy shoes and

  each sports a large wristwatch,

  and while other men only

  slightly younger than themselves still must

  fight for survival

  in the arena of daily existence

  they sit about and argue

  whether the screen pass is still

  an effective offensive weapon in professional

  football.

  they bet, first gathering in front of the

  window, arguing, making last minute

  adjustments, then one of them bets for

  all of them.

  after the races end each

  evening they leave,

  a wavering line,

  some stumbling a bit as if

  they were tripping over their own

  feet.

  now they look worn and done,

  defeated.

  “shit, this god-damned place, catch

  me here again and you can belt-whip me

  until I sing Dixie!”

  “yeah, sure, Marty, you’ll be back tomorrow.”

  “naw. fuck this place!”

  the next afternoon they are all back,

  somehow they’ve found a small supply of

  new money—they will pool it and their brains

  and do it all over again today.

  they are suddenly serious, studying their

  Racing Forms.

  they bet the first two races and things go

  wrong. the conversation jumps angrily from

  horses to sports and the screaming

  begins:

  “YEAH, YOU KNOW WHAT? I’LL BET YOU

  NEVER HEARD OF CRAZYLEGS

  HIRSCH!”

  “I SAW HIM, MAN! I SAW HIM PLAY!”

  “YEAH? WELL, I SAW JIM THORPE!”

  “YEAH? YOU SAW JIM THORPE JUST LIKE YOU

  GOT LAID LAST NIGHT!”

  “YEAH, I NOTICE YOU CAN HARDLY SIT DOWN TODAY!

  DID YOU GET LAID LAST NIGHT?”

  “I’LL KNOCK YOUR GOD-DAMNED HEAD OFF!”

  the combat never evolves and that’s all well

  and good, for they are fine fellows, we

  need them like we need the Sierra Madre mountains

  choking behind us in the smog, like we need

  Willie Shoemaker legging it up on just

  one more winner, and we need them to help us

  forget all the things that haven’t worked out for us

  in the past, especially all the bad bets

  what counts is to endure, what counts

  is not to remember that the whole western slope

  of the U.S.A. is going to fall into the Pacific Ocean

  one day soon

  and that there was never any real need to cultivate your

  garden or to send your daughter to

  Radcliffe.

  I like to watch those fellows, they are

  like a Broadway musical, only it’s not

  Guys and Dolls it’s Guys and Guys, they

  are all fine fellows, the wavering line of

  them, and even the most beautiful woman in the

  world would mean nothing to them

  because they have learned the hard way

  that that kind of thing only

  exists for other people, and there’s

  just no use wondering how things got that way or

  why.

  I watch the best Broadway musical

  every day from the best seat in the

  house and I am the author and the critic and the

  audience and sometimes I’m on stage

  too.

  THE ROAD TO HELL

  if only there were more magic people

  to help us get through

  this strange life.

  surprisingly there are a few.

  the problem being that often

  their magic doesn’t hold up

  for long

  mainly

  because they begin to

  think it’s because

  they are special

  when really

  it’s almost an off-hand thing

  like some damned crazy unearned

  gift.

  and when the magic people

  begin to misuse their

  prowess

  begin to use it

  in the wrong ways

  then

  it

  vanishes

  and

  that’s a

  LAW

  and

  it’s one of the most

  unalterable laws

  of the gods and the

  universe

  and there is

  nothing sadder

  or more

  frightening

  than the once-gifted ones

  still trying to work their

  magic

  for the

  crowd

  which never offers,

  but only

  accepts,

  mercy.

  CRUCIFIXION

  now we must select with extreme caution our lovers,

  water, foodstuffs and even our invisible

  air.

  it is a very careful time.

  our politicians consider ways to dismantle

  the worldwide stockpile of bombs

  all too late, of course, since it only takes one fool to

  push one button

  somewhere.

  we draw close together, frightened, searching for a return

  to a safe

  womb.

  but we must have been wrong for too long. the asylums overflow and spill their

  detritus into our streets

  and where our leaders once spoke wisely

  they now speak gibberish—

  they stop, then continue, look about, addled,

  substituting insane slogans for real

  speech.

  this is the price we now pay: we can’t go

  back, we can’t go forward and we hang helpless, nailed to a

  world

  of our own

  making.

  BARFLY

  Jane, who has been dead for 31 years,

  never could have

  imagined that I would write a screenplay of our drinking

  days together

  and

  that it would be made into a movie

  and

  that a beautiful movie star would play her

  part.

  I can hear Jane now: “A beautiful movie star? oh,

  for Christ’s sake!”

  Jane, that’s show biz, so go back to sleep, dear, because

  no matter how hard they tried they

  just couldn’t find anybody exactly like

  you.

  and neither can

  I.

  PART 2.

  bone-dead sorrows

  like starfish washed ashore.

  THOUGHTS WHILE EATING A SANDWICH

  we demand that our leaders possess

  a certain clever charm, a certain mild wisdom, but no madness,

  at least not madness at its

  best.

  maybe the energy is just not there anymore, maybe

  not only is the air polluted, maybe the brain has been

  poisoned, maybe the human spirit has been

  diluted down to a dim imitation of

  itself


  until anybody who appears half-right half-the-time is

  almost always accepted as our new

  hero-leader.

  it is more and more difficult—no, it’s just damned

  impossible—to accept and admire those who are

  deemed great in our time.

  they all

  are suspect

  they all seem to lack:

  nobility

  originality

  intelligence

  honesty

  and especially that which is most needed:

  a simple, good heart.

  just bones and more bones

  bleaching in the sun.

  they say that nothing is wasted:

  either that

  or

  it all is.

  NOTHING’S FREE

  got this letter

  where she wrote:

  I’m not going to do the obvious and

  throw in a photo

  but don’t worry

  I’ve got a BODY

  and the face

  is not so bad

  either.

  anyhow, I really admire

  your books although

  I just discovered them

  recently.

  you see I am

  only 18 years old but

  I’d like to be your

  secretary

  kind of keep house for you

  answer the phone

  all that

  and just room and board

  would do—

  no salary

  and

  I wouldn’t ask you

  for sex

  unless you asked me

  first …

  you can be sure

  I tossed that letter

  into the

  trash can

  right away.

  WHAT BOTHERS THEM MOST

  Sandra used to phone me almost

  nightly.

  “what are you doing?”

  “nothing.”

  “you mean, you aren’t with

  anybody yet?”

  “no.”

  “why not?”

  “who needs it?”

  (I hang up)

  they simply never understand,

  do they,

  that sometimes solitude is

  one of the most beautiful things

  on earth?

  (then the phone rings again,

  a few nights later)

  “well, are you with anybody yet?”

  “no.”

  “why don’t you ask me if I’m

  with somebody?”

  “are you with somebody?”

  “not now, but I’ve been going out

  with Tim.”

  “Tim’s a good guy, tell him

  I said ‘hello’.”

  (I hang up)

  I found my nights to be perfectly

  pleasant and the day as pleasant

  too.

  I typed and laughed my ass

  off

  then strapped it back on and

  typed some

  more.

  one night

  while I was

  typing and

  laughing my ass off

  I heard high heels

 

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