if I suffer at this typewriter think how I’d feel among the lettuce- pickers of Salinas? I think of the men I’ve known in factories with no way to get out- choking while living choking while laughing at Bob Hope or Lucille Ball while 2 or 3 children beat tennis balls against the wall. some suicides are never recorded.
āThat’s the problem with drinking, I thought, as I poured myself a drink. If something bad happens you drink in an attempt to forget; if something good happens you drink in order to celebrate; and if nothing happens you drink to make something happen.ā Ā ā Charles Bukowski, WomenĀ Ā Ā Ā Ā š
we had goldfish and they circled around and around
in the bowl on the table near the heavy drapes
covering the picture window and
my mother, always smiling, wanting us all
to be happy, told me, ‘be happy Henry!’
and she was right: it’s better to be happy if you
can
but my father continued to beat her and me several times a week while
raging inside his 6-foot-two frame because he couldn’t
understand what was attacking him from within.
my mother, poor fish,
wanting to be happy, beaten two or three times a
week, telling me to be happy: ‘Henry, smile!
why don’t you ever smile?’
and then she would smile, to show me how, and it was the
saddest smile I ever saw
one day the goldfish died, all five of them,
they floated on the water, on their sides, their
eyes still open,
and when my father got home he threw them to the cat
there on the kitchen floor and we watched as my mother
smiled
āThe free soul is rare, but you know it when you see it – basically because you feel good, very good, when you are near or with them.ā ā Charles Bukowski
“thereās a bluebird in my heart that wants to get out but Iām too tough for him, I say, stay in there, Iām not going to let anybody see you.
thereās a bluebird in my heart that wants to get out but I pur whiskey on him and inhale cigarette smoke and the whores and the bartenders and the grocery clerks never know that heās in there.
thereās a bluebird in my heart that wants to get out but Iām too tough for him, I say, stay down, do you want to mess me up? you want to screw up the works? you want to blow my book sales in Europe?
thereās a bluebird in my heart that wants to get out but Iām too clever, I only let him out at night sometimes when everybodyās asleep. I say, I know that youāre there, so donāt be sad. then I put him back, but heās singing a little in there, I havenāt quite let him die and we sleep together like that with our secret pact and itās nice enough to make a man weep, but I donāt weep, do you?”