Blog on Charles Bukowski,
great Poetry- that is dark and gritty.
He who truly understands Charles Bukowski,
sees the dark of the world, its pains and
has a much better understanding of life.
RJL
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https://poets.org/poem/so-you-want-be-writer
*****
(1.)
this kind of fire
Charles Bukowski - 1920-1994
sometimes I think the gods
deliberately keep pushing me
into the fire
just to hear me
yelp
a few good
lines.
they just aren't going to
let me retire
silk scarf about neck
giving lectures at
Yale.
the gods need me to
entertain them.
they must be terribly
bored with all
the others
and I am too.
and now my cigarette lighter
has gone dry.
I sit here
hopelessly
flicking it.
this kind of fire
they can't give
me.
From The Continual Condtion by Charles Bukowski.
Copyright © 2009 by Linda Lee Bukowski.
(2.)
so you want to be a writer?
Charles Bukowski - 1920-1994
if it doesn't come bursting out of you
in spite of everything,
don't do it.
unless it comes unasked out of your
heart and your mind and your mouth
and your gut,
don't do it.
if you have to sit for hours
staring at your computer screen
or hunched over your
typewriter
searching for words,
don't do it.
if you're doing it for money or
fame,
don't do it.
if you're doing it because you want
women in your bed,
don't do it.
if you have to sit there and
rewrite it again and again,
don't do it.
if it's hard work just thinking about doing it,
don't do it.
if you're trying to write like somebody
else,
forget about it.
if you have to wait for it to roar out of
you,
then wait patiently.
if it never does roar out of you,
do something else.
if you first have to read it to your wife
or your girlfriend or your boyfriend
or your parents or to anybody at all,
you're not ready.
don't be like so many writers,
don't be like so many thousands of
people who call themselves writers,
don't be dull and boring and
pretentious, don't be consumed with self-
love.
the libraries of the world have
yawned themselves to
sleep
over your kind.
don't add to that.
don't do it.
unless it comes out of
your soul like a rocket,
unless being still would
drive you to madness or
suicide or murder,
don't do it.
unless the sun inside you is
burning your gut,
don't do it.
when it is truly time,
and if you have been chosen,
it will do it by
itself and it will keep on doing it
until you die or it dies in you.
there is no other way.
and there never was.
From sifting through the madness for the Word, the line,
the way by Charles Bukowski.
Copyright © 2003 by the Estate of Charles Bukowski.
*****
(3.)
the suicide kid
Charles Bukowski - 1920-1994
I went to the worst of bars
hoping to get
killed.
but all I could do was to
get drunk
again.
worse, the bar patrons even
ended up
liking me.
there I was trying to get
pushed over the dark
edge
and I ended up with
free drinks
while somewhere else
some poor
son-of-a-bitch was in a hospital
bed,
tubes sticking out all over
him
as he fought like hell
to live.
nobody would help me
die as
the drinks kept
coming,
as the next day
waited for me
with its steel clamps,
its stinking
anonymity,
its incogitant
attitude.
death doesn't always
come running
when you call
it,
not even if you
call it
from a shining
castle
or from an ocean liner
or from the best bar
on earth (or the
worst).
such impertinence
only makes the gods
hesitate and
delay.
ask me: I'm
72.
Copyright © 2005 by Charles Bukowski.
From Slouching Toward Nirvana: New Poems.
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To many- any poet that wrote as dark and gritty as did Bukowski is looked upon with disdain. To me, such is a completely wrong-headed view. I see it as, a true poet that writes straight from the heart. Which is the very essence of poetry, and is also being a true poet.
And Charles Bukowski was not only a true poet but also a very great one as well.
Certainly, a top poet that should be deeply studied
read, and truly appreciated for that which he gave
to poetry, this world, and we that so love poetry. RJL