Notes of a Dirty Old Man. Charles Bukowski

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СКАЧАТЬ drinking wine. they always figure that a hermit is insane, and they may be right.

      he goes through the book. jesus christ, it’s a catsass sitting there with that hangover and the water down there, and here is Jack going through the book, I see spots of sunlight, noses, ears, the sheen of the photographic pages. I don’t care, but I guess we need something to talk about and I don’t talk well and he is doing the work, so here we go, Venice canal, the whole chickenshit sadness of living it out —

      “this guy went nuts about 2 years ago.”

      “this guy wanted me to suck his dick in order to get my book published.”

      “did you?”

      “did I? I belted him out! wit’ dis!”

      he shows me the Bronx fist.

      I laugh. he’s comfortable and he’s human. every man is afraid of being a queer. I get a little tired of it. maybe we should all become queers and relax. not belting Jack. he’s good for a change. there are too many people afraid to speak against queers — intellectually. just as there are too many people afraid to speak against the left wing — intellectually. I don’t care which way it goes — I only know: there are too many people afraid.

      so Jack’s good meat. I’ve seen too many intellectuals lately. I get very tired of the precious intellects who must speak diamonds every time they open their mouths. I get tired of battling for each space of air for the mind. that’s why I stayed away from people for so long, and now that I am meeting people, I find that I must return to my cave. there are other things beside the mind: there are insects and palm trees and pepper shakers, and I’ll have a pepper-shaker in my cave, so laugh.

      the people will always betray you.

      never trust the people.

      “the whole poetry game is run by the fags and the left-wing,” he tells me, staring into the canal.

      there is a kind of truth here that it is bitter and false to dispute and I don’t know what to do with it. I am certainly aware that there is something wrong with the poetry game — the books of the famous are so very dull, including Shakespeare. was it the same then?

      I decide to throw Jack some shit.

      “remember the old poetry mag? I don’t know if it was Monroe or Shapiro or what, now it’s gotten so bad I don’t read it anymore, but I remember a statement by Whitman:

      “ ‘to have great poets we need great audiences.’ well, I always figure a Whitman a greater poet than I, if that matters, only this time I think he got the thing backwards. it should read:

      “ ‘to have great audiences we need great poets.’ ”

      “yeah, so, all right,” Jack said, “I met Creeley at a party this time and I asked him if he ever read Bukowski and he got frozen real solid, wouldn’t answer me, man, like you know what I mean.”

      “let’s get the fuck outa here,” I say.

      we go out toward my car. I’ve got a car, somehow. a lemon, of course. Jack’s got the book with him. he’s still turning pages.

      “this guy sucks dick.”

      “oh yeah?”

      “this guy married a schoolteacher who belts his ass with a whip. horrible woman. he ain’t writ a word since his marriage. she’s got his soul in her cunt-strap.”

      “you talking about Gregory or Kero?”

      “no, this is another one!”

      “holy Jesus!”

      we keep walking toward my car. I feel rather dull but I can FEEL this man’s energy, ENERGY, and I realize that it might be possible that I am walking next to one of the few immortal and unschooled poets of our time. and then, that doesn’t matter either, after I think about it a moment.

      I get on in. the lemon starts but the gearshift is fucked-up again. I’ve got to drive in low all the way and the bitch stalls at every signal, battery down, I pray, one more start, no cops, no more drunk-driving raps, no more christs of any kinds on anybody’s kind of Cross, we can choose between Nixon and Humphrey and Christ and be fucked anyway we turn, and I turn left, brake up at the address and we get out.

      Jack’s still at the pages.

      “this guy’s o.k. he killed himself, his father, his mother, wife, but didn’t shoot his three children or the dog. one of the best poets since Baudelaire.”

      “yeah?”

      “yeah, shit.”

      we get out of the lemon as I make the sign of the Cross for one more start on the mother battery.

      we walk up and Jack bangs a door.

      “BIRD! BIRD! this is Jack!”

      the door opens and there is the Bird. I look twice. I can’t see whether it is a woman or a man. the face is the distilled essence opium of untouched beauty. it’s a man. the motions are man. I know it but I also know that he can catch hell and ultimate brutality every time he hits the streets. they will kill him because he has not died at all. I have died nine-tenths but keep the other one-tenth like a gun. I can walk down the street and they can’t tell me from the news vendor, even tho the news vendors have more beautiful faces than any president of the united states, but then, that’s no task either.

      “Bird, I need 20,” says Jack.

      Bird peels off a g.d. twenty. his movement is smooth, without worry.

      “thanks, baby.”

      “sure, can you come on in?”

      “all right.”

      we move in. sit down, there’s the bookcase. I lay my eyes across it. there doesn’t seem to be a dull book in there. I catch all the books I’ve admired in there. what the hell? is it a dream? the kid’s face is so beautiful that everytime I look I feel good, like you know, chili and beans, hot, after coming off a bad one, the first food in weeks, well, fuck, I am always on guard.

      the Bird. and the ocean down there. and bad battery. a lemon. the cops patrolling their stupid dry streets. what a bad war it is. and what an idiot nightmare, only this momentary cool space between us, we are all going to be smashed, very quickly into broken children’s toys, into those highheels that ran so gaily down the stairway to be fucked out of it forever, forever, dunces and fools, dunces and tools, god damn our weak bravery.

      we sit down. a quart of scotch appears. I pour a quarter of a pint down without pause, ah, I gag, blink, idiot, working toward 50, still trying to play Hero. asshole hero in a fusillade of puke.

      the Bird’s wife comes in. we are introduced. she is a liquid woman in a brown dress, she just flows flows her eyes laughing, she flows, I tell you, she flows,

      “WOW WOW WOW!” I say.

      she looks so good I’ve got to pick her up, hug her, I carry her on my left hip, spin her, laugh. nobody thinks that I am crazy. we all laugh. we all understand. I put her down. СКАЧАТЬ