calling.
Raymond asked, have you never forgotten it?
I did for a while, but then strangely I began to
miss the abuse …
the butler returned carrying Raymond’s
drink on a silver tray.
here is your drink, sir, said the butler.
thank you, said Raymond, taking it off the tray.
o.k., Paul, Fuch said to the butler, you can
start now.
now? asked the butler.
now, came the answer.
the butler stood in front of Fuch and screamed:
fucky-boy! fucky-baby! fuck-face! fuck-brain!
where did your name come from, fuck-head?
how come you’re such a fuck-up?
etc….
they all started laughing uncontrollably
as the butler delivered his tirade in that
beautiful British accent.
they couldn’t stop laughing, they fell out of their
chairs and got down on the rug, pounding it and
laughing, Fuch, his lovely young wife and Raymond
in that sprawling mansion overlooking the shining sea.
I dreamt
that I was
in my room
having been
shot in the belly
by some tart.
snakes crawled the
floor
while outside
a schoolmaster
sang
an old school
song
then
the curtains
went up in
flame
the phone
rang
everything
seemed
in a hurry
to die
so I
decided to
die
which made all the
bad poets
happy
and all the good poets
glad
as they
rushed in
to fill
the vacancy
then the dream
was
over
I awakened
and I was
the Bad Boy
of poetry
all over
again.
the old couple next door
they were an old couple
and she slept with her
head at one end of the
bed
and he with his head
at the other
end.
they explained that
in case somebody
came in to murder
them
at least one of them
would have a
better chance to
escape.
when he died
she had a stuffed replica
made of his
body
and she slept with
her head at one end
of the bed
and the replica’s
head was down at the
other.
and just like in the
past,
at least once every
night,
she would awaken
in a fury and
scream,
“STOP
THAT
GODDAMNED
SNORING!”
men without women
finally,
goaded by the high price of
female relationships
he lashed his ankles to the
bedpoles
and tried to reach his
own
penis
with his
mouth:
close but no
cigar.
another of
nature’s dirty
tricks.
finally, in a
fury, he gave it a last
mad
attempt.
something cracked in his
back
and a blue flame
engulfed his
brain.
after 45 minutes of
agony
he got himself off
the bed,
found he couldn’t stand
straight.
each time he tried
a hundred knives cut
into both his back and
his soul.
the next day
he managed to drive to
the doctor’s
office
bent low over the
steering wheel
barely able to
see through the
windshield.
“how did you do this?”
the
doctor
asked.
he told the doctor
the honest
truth
because he felt
that an informed
diagnosis
was the only chance
for a complete
cure.
“what?” said the
doctor. “you’re
kidding?”
“no, that’s what
happened.”
“please excuse me,
I’ll be right
back.”
there was a dead
silence.
then he heard the
soft laughter of
the doctor and the
nurse from
behind the door.
then it grew
louder.
he sat there
looking out the office
window: there was a park outside
with lovely mature trees, it was
a fine summer afternoon
the birds were out in force and
for some odd reason
he longed for a shimmering bowl
of cool wet grapes.
the laughter behind the door
grew softer again
and then died out
as he sat there
waiting.
the “Beats”
some keep trying to connect me with
the “Beats”
but I was almost unpublished in the
1950s
and
even then
I very much
distrusted their vanity and
all that
public
posturing.
and when I met a few of them
later in life
I realized that most of my original
feelings for
them
hadn’t
changed.
some of my friends accepted
that; others thought that I
should change my
opinion.
my opinion remains the
same: writing is done
one person
at a time
one place
at a time
and all the gatherings
of
the
flock
have very little
to do
with
anything.
any one of them
could have made
a decent living as a
bill collector or a
used car
salesman
and they still
could
make an honest living
instead of bitching about
changes of fashion and
the ways of fate.
but instead
from the sad university
lecterns
and in the poetry halls
these hucksters of the
despoiled word
are still clamoring for
handouts,
still talking the same
dumb
shit.
hurry slowly
when will you take to the cane,
Chinaski?
when will you walk that short-legged
dog into the last
sunset?
that wrinkled-nosed dog
snorting and sniffing
before you
as the sidewalks part
and the ocean roars in
bearing beautiful
mermaids.
straighten your back,
the sun is rushing past
you,
grin at the gods,
they only lent you the luck and the
mirage.
Chinaski?
you hear me?
the young girls of your dreams
have grown old.
Chinaski,
let it go,
the music has finished.
Chinaski?
Chinaski, don’t you hear
me?
why do you keep trying?
nobody is watching.
nobody cares,
not even you.
you are alone, Chinaski,
and below the stage
the seats are
empty.
the theatre is dark.
why do you keep
acting?
what a bad
habit.
the air is so still,
the air is black and still as
you move through the last of
yourself,
give way, give way
old poet,
hanging by the last thread,
use your courage
write that last line,
get out, get out, get out,
get out, get out, get out,
it’s easy,
the last classic
act.
the coast is clear,
now.
hello and goodbye
there’s no hell like your own hell,
none can compare,
twisting in the sheets at night,
your ass freezing,
your mind on fire,
everything stupid, stupid,
as you are stuck in your poor body and in
your poor life
and it’s all slowly dissolving, dissolving
into nothing.
like all the other bodies, like all the other
lives,
we all are being counted out,
taken down
by disease
by just being rubbed up against
the hard days, the harder years.
there’s no escaping
this,
we just have to take it,
accept it—
or like most—
not think about it.
at all.
shoes off and on.
holidays come and gone.
hello,
goodbye.
dress, undress.
eat, sleep.
drive an automobile.
pay your taxes.
wash under the arms and
behind the neck
and scrub everything
else, for sure.
pick your coffin ahead
of time.
feel the smooth wood.
go for the soft, padded, expensive
interior.
the salesman will commend you
on your good
taste.
then horrify him.
tell him you want to try it for
size.
there’s no hell like your own
hell and there’s nobody else
ever
to share it with
you.
you might as well be the only
person left on earth.
sometimes you feel as if you
were.
and maybe you are.
meanwhile, pluck the lint from
your belly button,
accept what is,
get laid once in a while,
shake hands with nothing at all.
it’s always been like this, it’s always been like
this.
don’t scream.
there’s nobody left to hear
you.
strange things,
strange things these cities, the trees,
our feet walking the sidewalks,
the blood inside us
lubricating our
hearts,
the centuries finally shot apart
as you slip on your stockings and pull them
up over your
ankles.
I will never have
a house in the valley
with little stone men
on the lawn.
don’t call me, I’ll call you
once more
the typing is about
finished
poems scatter the
floor
this smoky room
the symphony of a
dead
man
the lamp
looks at me
from my
left
it is late
night
moving
into
morning
I have lived
again
the lucky
hours
then the
phone
rings
son-of-a-
bitch:
impossible!
but my wife
will get
the
phone
perhaps
it’s for
her
it can’t be
for
me
I’d kill
anybody
who would
spoil
what
the gods
have sent
this old
fellow
once
again
as the dark
trees
shake
outside
as death
finally
is a monkey
caught
in a
cage.
taking the 8 count
“today,” says the radio announcer,
“is Bastille Day.
203 years ago they stormed the Bastille,”
and that is the highlight of my day.
I have really been burnt out lately.
I go outside,
undress,
get in the pool, wrap my blue
floater around my gut
and water-jog.
I feel like an old man.
hell, I am an old man.
when I was born it was only 132 years back to
Bastille Day.
now, pains in my right leg and foot make for
a long day at the track
and the decades cling to me like
leeches,
sucking my energy and
my spirit.
but I intend to make a comeback
very soon.
I need the action, the gamble.
now I am drinking a cold beer.
I relax and just float.
suddenly things look better.
the leg and foot no l
onger hurt.
I even begin to feel good.
I’m not done yet!
I will remain in the arena.
hail, Bastille Day!
hail all the old dogs!
hail you!
hail me!
that last good
night is not yet here.
going going gone
my wife doesn’t see much of me
anymore
since she got me this computer
for Xmas.
I never thought anything could consume
me like it
has.
the poems arrive by the
dozens
and yesterday there was even a decent bit
of prose.
I’ve now gone the complete route.
I once hand-printed all my poems and
stories.
then came the manual
typewriter.
then the electric typer.
and now this.
it’s as if I have been reborn.
I watch the words form on the
screen
and as I watch more and more
words
form.
and, actually, the content seems
to be
as good as ever.
things get said as they have
always been said.
only now it’s more like setting off
firecrackers or
exploding words into outer
space.
I’ve been told that the computer
can’t write for me.
hell, I don’t know, this thing
seems to have a
psyche
all its own
and it certainly spells