The Best of Bukowski: Poems 1951-1993

 
The Best of Bukowski
 
Poems 1951-1993
Extraordinary sensibility
Uncompromising linguistic brilliance
Renegade early work
Never-before-collected final days
Laureate of American low life
 
‘He brought everybody down to earth, even the angels’
 
The Mockingbird
“feathers parted like a
woman’s legs and the bird
was no longer mocking”
 
His Wife, The Painter
“He feels the hated and discard
of the world, sharper than his
razor and his gut feelings like a
wet polyp”
“About church: the trouble with
a mask is it never changes”
 
On the sidewalk
and in the sun
“If he’d only throw that
pack away, I think, he’d
have a chance, not much
of a chance but a chance”
 
The Elephants of
Vietnam
“I’d tell my buddies, listen,
you guys stop that, but
they just laughed”
 
Dark Night Poem
“they say that nothing is
wasted: either that or it all is”
 
The Last Days of
the Suicide Kid
“The lovely women walk by
with big hot hips and warm
buttocks and tight hot
everything praying to be
loved and I don’t even exist”
 
Tabby Cat
“and the girls who are
yours now will soon
belong to other men
who didn’t get their
cookies and cream so
easily and so early”
 
Metamorphosis
“I felt better when
everything was in
disorder… I have lost my
rhythm. I can’t sleep. I
can’t eat. I have been
robbed of my filth.”
 
A poem is a city
“a poem is a city filled with
streets and sewers, filled with
saints, heroes, beggars and
madmen, filled with banality
and booze, filled with rain and
thunder and…drought”
 
A poem is a city
“and now I stick this under
glass for the mad editor’s
scrutiny…the trumpets bring
on gallows as small men rant
at things they cannot do”
 
A Smile to
Remember
“it  was the saddest smile
I ever saw”
 
A Free 25-page booklet
“nothing like a beautiful broad dragging it pas you on the
sidewalk, moving it past your famished window, she’s dressed in
the finest cloth, she doesn’t care what you say, how you look what
you do as long as you do not get in her way… ah, the bravado is
gone, the big run through the center is gone, on a windy
afternoon in Hollywood my radio cracks and spits its dirty music
through a floor full of empty beerbottles”
 
They, all of them, know
“ask the most miserable man you
can, find in his most miserable
moment…ask  the tempted, the
damned, the foolish, the wise, the
slavering…ask the moth, the monk…
 
…the madman, ask the man who
draws cartoons for The New
Yorker…ask the man you hate
the most in this world…ask the
fire the fire the fire, ask even the
liars…ask any of these of all of
these, ask ask ask and they’ll all
tell you: a snarling wife on the
balustrade is more than a man
can bear”
 
HIGHLIGHTS
AND QUOTES
FROM
BUKOWSKI’S
POETRY
 
A Future
Congressman
“that boy was ready for
his life to come, he
would undoubtedly be
highly successful, the
lying little prick”
 
Eulogy
“With old cars, especially when you buy
them second-hand and drive them for
many years, a love affair is inevitable: you
even learn to accept their little
eccentricities…you also learn all the tricks
to keep the love affair alive…and you
overlook each burn hole in the upholstery”
 
The Drowning
---------------------
“it is just another hot
evening in Los Angeles:
some bricks, a
mongoose or two,
Chimera and disbelief.”
 
Fooling Marie
Story of an extra-marital
affair with a buxom blonde
in a motel:
“he saw the word scrawled
on the dresser mirror in
pink lipstick: SUCKER.”
 
The young man on the bus stop bench
“nobody bothers him. People leave him alone. The police leave
him alone. He could be the 2
nd
 coming of Christ but I doubt
it…as I drive past the young man on the bus stop bench, I am
comfortable in my automobile. I have money in two different
banks. I own my own home but he reminds me of my young
self and I want to help him but I don’t know what to do.”
 
Harbor Freeway South
“these cars scattered like toys
against the freeway center
divider…it’s like somebody dying of
a heart attack in a crowded
elevator”
 
For they had things to say
-------------------------------------
“sitting in a warm night’s
semicircle, and the keys
were black and white and
responded to my fingers like
the locked-in magic of a
waiting, grown-up world”
 
Schoolyards of Forever
“the schoolyard was a horror show: the bullies, the freaks, the beatings up against the wire fence,
our schoolmates watching glad that they were not the victim…taunted all the way home where
often more beatings awaited us…then college where under a new regime, the bullies melted
almost entirely away. We became more and they became much less. But there were new bullies
now, [the victims were] the professors…we looked right through them to a larger fight waiting out
there…bosses… in small rooms of madness.”
 
In the lobby
“he began to shake like an ape
who’d had a banana taken from
his hand…the crowd looked at the
old as if he were a freak, as if
there was something wrong with
him”
 
Sex
“while I am listening to Beethoven
on the car radio, she enters a small
grocery store and is gone and I am
left with Ludwig”
 
Something for the touts, the nuns,
the grocery clerks and you…
“the gravediggers play poker over 5am coffee, waiting
for the grass to dismiss the frost”
 
Blue beads and bones
“as the orchid dies and the grass
goes insane, let’s have one for the
lost…as only the truly lost sit in
bars on Tuesday mornings…you
guys can go to skid row when
things get bad. But where can a
woman go?”
 
Like a cherry seed
in the throat
“naked in that bright light
the four horse falls and
throws a 112-pound boy
into the hooves of 35,000
eyes, good night sweet
little mother f-er”
 
Turnabout
“it’s all quite dramatic
and I enjoy it…it’s very
quiet and I fell like I
have a spear rammed
into the center of my
gut…mercy, I think,
doesn’t the human
race know anything
about mercy?”
 
The girl outside the supermarket
“a very tall girl lifts her nose at me…as if I were a
walking garbage can; and I had no desire for her,
no more desire than for a phone pole. What was
her message? That I would never see the top of
her pantyhose?...sex is no longer an aching
mystery”
 
It is not much
“I have come
through fire and
sword, love gone
wrong, head-on
crashes, drunk at
sea…we have a
critical sense and are
not easy to fool with
laughter”
 
2 Outside, As
Bones Break in
My Kitchen
“he more coward on his
knees praying for more
days…and she says nothing
and hacks a hole where a
tulip never grew.”
 
The Japanese Wife
“Japanese women, real women,
they have not forgotten bowing
and smiling closing the wounds
men have made. American
women will kill you like they tear
a lampshade…always scowling,
belly-aching, disillusioned,
overwrought…”
 
The Harder You Try
“The waste of words continues with a
stunning persistence…Just being able
to scratch yourself and be nonchalant
is victory enough. Those constipated
minds that seek larger meaning will be
dispatched with the other garbage.
Back off. If there is light it will find you”
 
The lady in
red
“the best time of all
was when John
Dillinger escaped
from jail, and one of
the saddest times of
all was when the
Lady in Red fingered
him and he was
gunned down
coming out of that
movie.”
 
The Shower
 
I Was Glad
 
The Angel Who Pushed
His Wheelchair
“”
 
A Time to Remember
“”
 
The wrong
way
“”
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Delve into the extraordinary sensibility and linguistic brilliance of Charles Bukowski, the laureate of American low life. Explore his renegade early work and never-before-collected final days through a collection of poignant poems that bring everyone down to earth, including angels.


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  1. The Best of Bukowski He brought everybody down to earth, even the angels Poems 1951-1993 Extraordinary sensibility Uncompromising linguistic brilliance Renegade early work Never-before-collected final days Laureate of American low life

  2. HIGHLIGHTS AND QUOTES His Wife, The Painter He feels the hated and discard of the world, sharper than his razor and his gut feelings like a wet polyp About church: the trouble with a mask is it never changes On the sidewalk and in the sun If he d only throw that pack away, I think, he d have a chance, not much of a chance but a chance The Mockingbird feathers parted like a woman s legs and the bird was no longer mocking FROM BUKOWSKI S POETRY The Elephants of Vietnam I d tell my buddies, listen, you guys stop that, but they just laughed The Last Days of the Suicide Kid The lovely women walk by with big hot hips and warm buttocks and tight hot everything praying to be loved and I don t even exist Tabby Cat and the girls who are yours now will soon belong to other men who didn t get their cookies and cream so easily and so early Dark Night Poem they say that nothing is wasted: either that or it all is A poem is a city a poem is a city filled with streets and sewers, filled with saints, heroes, beggars and madmen, filled with banality and booze, filled with rain and thunder and drought Metamorphosis I felt better when everything was in disorder I have lost my rhythm. I can t sleep. I can t eat. I have been robbed of my filth. A Smile to Remember it was the saddest smile I ever saw A poem is a city and now I stick this under glass for the mad editor s scrutiny the trumpets bring on gallows as small men rant at things they cannot do A Free 25-page booklet nothing like a beautiful broad dragging it pas you on the sidewalk, moving it past your famished window, she s dressed in the finest cloth, she doesn t care what you say, how you look what you do as long as you do not get in her way ah, the bravado is gone, the big run through the center is gone, on a windy afternoon in Hollywood my radio cracks and spits its dirty music through a floor full of empty beerbottles the madman, ask the man who draws cartoons for The New Yorker ask the man you hate the most in this world ask the fire the fire the fire, ask even the liars ask any of these of all of these, ask ask ask and they ll all tell you: a snarling wife on the balustrade is more than a man can bear They, all of them, know ask the most miserable man you can, find in his most miserable moment ask the tempted, the damned, the foolish, the wise, the slavering ask the moth, the monk

  3. Eulogy With old cars, especially when you buy them second-hand and drive them for many years, a love affair is inevitable: you even learn to accept their little eccentricities you also learn all the tricks to keep the love affair alive and you overlook each burn hole in the upholstery Fooling Marie Story of an extra-marital affair with a buxom blonde in a motel: he saw the word scrawled on the dresser mirror in pink lipstick: SUCKER. The Drowning --------------------- it is just another hot evening in Los Angeles: some bricks, a mongoose or two, Chimera and disbelief. A Future Congressman that boy was ready for his life to come, he would undoubtedly be highly successful, the lying little prick Harbor Freeway South these cars scattered like toys against the freeway center divider it s like somebody dying of a heart attack in a crowded elevator For they had things to say ------------------------------------- sitting in a warm night s semicircle, and the keys were black and white and responded to my fingers like the locked-in magic of a waiting, grown-up world The young man on the bus stop bench nobody bothers him. People leave him alone. The police leave him alone. He could be the 2nd coming of Christ but I doubt it as I drive past the young man on the bus stop bench, I am comfortable in my automobile. I have money in two different banks. I own my own home but he reminds me of my young self and I want to help him but I don t know what to do. In the lobby he began to shake like an ape who d had a banana taken from his hand the crowd looked at the old as if he were a freak, as if there was something wrong with him Schoolyards of Forever the schoolyard was a horror show: the bullies, the freaks, the beatings up against the wire fence, our schoolmates watching glad that they were not the victim taunted all the way home where often more beatings awaited us then college where under a new regime, the bullies melted almost entirely away. We became more and they became much less. But there were new bullies now, [the victims were] the professors we looked right through them to a larger fight waiting out there bosses in small rooms of madness. Blue beads and bones as the orchid dies and the grass goes insane, let s have one for the lost as only the truly lost sit in bars on Tuesday mornings you guys can go to skid row when things get bad. But where can a woman go? Sex while I am listening to Beethoven on the car radio, she enters a small grocery store and is gone and I am left with Ludwig Something for the touts, the nuns, the grocery clerks and you the gravediggers play poker over 5am coffee, waiting for the grass to dismiss the frost

  4. Turnabout it s all quite dramatic and I enjoy it it s very quiet and I fell like I have a spear rammed into the center of my gut mercy, I think, doesn t the human race know anything about mercy? The girl outside the supermarket a very tall girl lifts her nose at me as if I were a walking garbage can; and I had no desire for her, no more desire than for a phone pole. What was her message? That I would never see the top of her pantyhose?...sex is no longer an aching mystery It is not much I have come through fire and sword, love gone wrong, head-on crashes, drunk at sea we have a critical sense and are not easy to fool with laughter Like a cherry seed in the throat naked in that bright light the four horse falls and throws a 112-pound boy into the hooves of 35,000 eyes, good night sweet little mother f-er The Harder You Try The waste of words continues with a stunning persistence Just being able to scratch yourself and be nonchalant is victory enough. Those constipated minds that seek larger meaning will be dispatched with the other garbage. Back off. If there is light it will find you 2 Outside, As Bones Break in My Kitchen he more coward on his knees praying for more days and she says nothing and hacks a hole where a tulip never grew. The Japanese Wife Japanese women, real women, they have not forgotten bowing and smiling closing the wounds men have made. American women will kill you like they tear a lampshade always scowling, belly-aching, disillusioned, overwrought The lady in red the best time of all was when John Dillinger escaped from jail, and one of the saddest times of all was when the Lady in Red fingered him and he was gunned down coming out of that movie. The Angel Who Pushed His Wheelchair The Shower I Was Glad The wrong way A Time to Remember

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