Jump to content

The poetry of Charles Bukowski


Fidel

Recommended Posts

Not trying to out do you Teddy, but I just watched Factotum, a movie about novelist and writer Charles Bukowski. Here's a sample of his poetry.

 

16-bit Intel 8088 chip

 

 

with an Apple Macintosh

you can't run Radio Shack programs

in its disc drive.

nor can a Commodore 64

drive read a file

you have created on an

IBM Personal Computer.

both Kaypro and Osborne computers use

the CP/M operating system

but can't read each other's

handwriting

for they format (write

on) discs in different

ways.

the Tandy 2000 runs MS-DOS but

can't use most programs produced for

the IBM Personal Computer

unless certain

bits and bytes are

altered

but the wind still blows over

Savannah

and in the Spring

the turkey buzzard struts and

flounces before his

hens.

 

Charles Bukowski

 

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi Teddy,

 

The movie is very funny. Watch it!

 

Munch Master, maybe you'll prefer this:

 

Girl In A Miniskirt Reading The Bible Outside My Window

 

 

Sunday, I am eating a

grapefruit, church is over at the Russian

Orthadox to the

west.

 

she is dark

of Eastern descent,

large brown eyes look up from the Bible

then down. a small red and black

Bible, and as she reads

her legs keep moving, moving,

she is doing a slow rythmic dance

reading the Bible. . .

 

long gold earrings;

2 gold bracelets on each arm,

and it's a mini-suit, I suppose,

the cloth hugs her body,

the lightest of tans is that cloth,

she twists this way and that,

long yellow legs warm in the sun. . .

 

there is no escaping her being

there is no desire to. . .

 

my radio is playing symphonic music

that she cannot hear

but her movements coincide exactly

to the rythms of the

symphony. . .

 

she is dark, she is dark

she is reading about God.

I am God.

 

Charles Bukowski

 

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I like Mason Williams myself. :)

 

 

How about them Ewe Doers, ain't they news?

Down in the pasture a doin' them Ewes.

Doin' them big sheeps, doin' them little

Doin' them lambs, hi-diddle-diddle!

 

Look at them Ewe Doers, ain't they creeps?

High boots on, chasin' them sheeps.

Them hooky dooky Ewe Doers, stompin' through the weeds, movin' them Ewies, fillin' they needs.

 

How to be a Ewe Doers? Ain't much to it;

Meet a sweet sheep, Then you do it!

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Check out Love is a Dog from Hell where he ruminates about beer, hookers, skanky bar hos, addiction, isolation and of course, love.

 

how to be a good writer

 

youâ??ve got to fuck a great many women

beautiful women

and write a few decent love poems.

 

and donâ??t worry about age

and/or freshly-arrived talents.

 

just drink more beer

more and more beer

 

and attend the racetrack at least once a

 

week

 

and win

if possible

 

learning to win is hard -

any slob can be a good loser.

 

and donâ??t forget your Brahms

and your Bach and your

beer.

 

donâ??t overexercise.

 

sleep until noon.

 

avoid paying credit cards

or paying for anything on

time.

 

remember that there isnâ??t a piece of ass

in this world over $50

(in 1977).

 

and if you have the ability to love

love yourself first

but always be aware of the possibility of

total defeat

whether the reason for that defeat

seems right or wrong -

 

an early taste of death is not necessarily

a bad thing.

 

stay out of churches and bars and museums,

and like the spider be

patient -

time is everybodyâ??s cross,

plus

exile

defeat

treachery

 

all that dross.

 

stay with the beer.

 

beer is continuous blood.

 

a continuous lover.

 

get a large typewriter

and as the footsteps go up and down

outside your window

 

hit that thing

hit it hard

 

make it a heavyweight fight

 

make it the bull when he first charges in

 

and remember the old dogs

who fought so well:

Hemingway, Celine, Dostoevsky, Hamsun.

 

If you think they didnâ??t go crazy

in tiny rooms

just like youâ??re doing now

 

without women

without food

without hope

 

then youâ??re not ready.

 

drink more beer.

thereâ??s time.

and if thereâ??s not

thatâ??s all right

too.

 

Charles Bukowski

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...