The Last Night of the Earth Poems by Charles Bukowski Read Free Book Online Page A

educated,
    intelligent, snobbish, inbred,
    formal, comfortable people
    out there
 
    they truly took their time to
    say, no.
 
    yes, in those dark beds
    with the landladies rustling about
    puttering and snooping, sharpening
    utensils,
    I often thought of those editors and
    publishers out there
    who didn’t recognize
    what I was trying to say
    in my special
    way
 
    and I thought, they must be
    wrong.
 
    then this would be followed
    with a thought much worse
    than that:
 
    I could be a
    fool:
 
    almost every writer thinks
    they are doing
    exceptional work.
    that’s
    normal.
 
    being a fool is
    normal.
 
    and then I’d
    get out of bed
    find a piece of
    paper
    and start
    writing
    again.

they don’t eat like us
     
     
    my father eating.
 
    his ears moved.
 
    he munched with great vigor.
 
    I wished him in hell.
 
    I watched the fork in his hand.
    I watched it put food into his mouth.
 
    the food I ate was tasteless and deadly.
    his small bits of conversation entered my head.
    the words ran down my spine.
    they spilled into my shoes.
 
    “eat your food, Henry,” my mother said.
 
    he said, “many people are starving and don’t eat as well as us!”
 
    I wished him in hell.
    I watched his fork.
    it gathered more food and put it into his mouth.
    he chewed in a dog-like fashion.
    his ears moved.
 
    the brutal beatings he gave me I was ready for.
    but watching him eat brought on the darkness.
    there at the tablecloth.
    there with the green and blue wooden napkin holders.
 
    “eat your food or I’ll strop your god damned ass,” he told me.
 
    later in life I made him pay somewhat.
    but he still owes me.
 
    and I’ll never collect.

let me tell you
     
     
    hell is built
    piece by piece
    brick by brick
    around
    you.
    it’s a gradual,
    not a rapid
    process.
 
    we build our
    own
    inferno,
    blame
    others.
 
    but hell is
    hell.
 
    wordly hell is
    hell.
 
    my hell and
    your
    hell.
 
    our
    hell.
 
    hell, hell,
    hell.
 
    the song of
    hell.
 
    putting your
    shoes on
    in the
    morning.
    hell.

blasted apart with the first breath
     
     
    running out of days
    as the banister glints
    in the early morning sun.
 
    there will be no rest
    even in our dreams.
 
    now, all there is to do is
    reset
    broken moments.
 
    when even to exist seems a
    victory
    then surely our luck has
    run thin
 
    thinner than a bloody stream
    toward death.
 
    life is a sad song:
    we have heard too many
    voices
    seen too many
    faces
    too many
    bodies
 
    worst have been the faces:
    a dirty joke that no one
    can understand.
 
    barbaric, senseless days total
    in your skull;
    reality is a juiceless
    orange.
    there is no plan
    no out
    no divinity
    no sparrow of
    joy.
 
    we can’t compare life to
    anything—that’s
    too dreary a
    prospect.
 
    relatively speaking,
    we were never short on
    courage
 
    but, at best, the odds
    remained long
    and
    at worst,
    unchangeable.
 
    and what was worst:
    not that we wasted
    it
    but that it was
    wasted
    on us:
 
    coming out of
    the Womb
    trapped
    in light and
    darkness
 
    stricken and numbed
 
    alone in the temperate zone of
    dumb agony
    now
 
    running out of days
    as the banister glints
    in the early morning sun.

Elvis lives
     
     
    the boy was going to take the bus out
    to see the
    Graceland Mansion
 
    then
    the Greyhound Lines went
    on strike.
 
    there were only two clerks
    and two lines
    at the station
    and the lines were
    50 to 65 people
    long.
 
    after two hours in line
    one of the clerks told the
    boy
    that his bus
    would leave
    as soon as the substitute
    driver arrived.
 
    “when will that be?” the
    boy asked.
 
    “we can’t
    be certain,” the
    clerk answered.
 
    the boy slept on the floor
    that night
    but by 9 a.m.
    the next morning
    the substitute driver
    still had not
    arrived.
    the boy had to wait
    in another line
    to get to the
    toilet.
 
    he finally got a
    stall, carefully
    fitted the
    sanitary toilet seat
    paper cover,
    pulled down his
    pants,
    his