The Poet's Poet

 ~

i always liked bukowski, but he's not writing anything anymore.

i enjoy sandra cisneros alot.

~snake

 

 

 

8 Count

~Charles 'Hank' Bukowski

 

from my bed
I watch
3 birds
on a telephone
wire.
one flies
off.
then
another.
one is left,
then
it too
is gone.
my typewriter is
tombstone
still.
and I am
reduced to bird
watching.
just thought I'd
let you
know,
fucker.

 

Charles 'Hank' Bukowski (1920-1994)

 

 

~snake

my ex & i used to publish a literary magazine called 'scree', and bukowski was a somewhat regular submitter in the 70's. his stuff was just always the cream of the crop of submissions. there are so many poems that just feel so real & give insight into inner demons, that i just loved him. i never met him, though i heard of his horrible readings. this one gives insight about how horrible they were for him too:

 

The Poetry Reading
~Charles 'Hank' Bukowski

at high noon
at a small college near the beach
sober
the sweat running down my arms
a spot of sweat on the table
I flatten it with my finger
blood money blood money
my god they must think I love this like the others
but it's for bread and beer and rent
blood money
I'm tense lousy feel bad
poor people I'm failing I'm failing
a woman gets up
walks out
slams the door
a dirty poem
somebody told me not to read dirty poems
here
it's too late.
my eyes can't see some lines
I read it
out-
desperate trembling
lousy
they can't hear my voice
and I say,
I quit, that's it, I'm
finished.
and later in my room
there's scotch and beer:
the blood of a coward.
this then
will be my destiny:
scrabbling for pennies in tiny dark halls
reading poems I have long since beome tired
of.
and I used to think
that men who drove buses
or cleaned out latrines
or murdered men in alleys were
fools.

 

 

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