Poems by Charles Bukowski

A smile to remember ….………………………………………... 2

Carson McCullers ……….…………………………………........ 3
Bluebird …………………………………………..…………….. 4
The Schoolyard of Forever ………………….………………….. 5
What can we do? ……………………………………………….. 8
Alone with everybody ………………………………...……….. 9
No help for that …………………………..…………….…….... 10
We Ain'T Got No Money, Honey, But We Got Rain…….……. 11
The Sun Wields Mercy ……………………………..….……… 18
Splash ……………………………….………………….……… 20
hello how are you …………………..…………….……………. 22
death wants more death ………………..………………………. 23
cut while shaving ……………………...….……………………. 25
love & fame & death ……………...........……………………… 26
Marina ……………………………………..…………...……… 27
And the moon and the stars and the world …………....……..... 28
Safe …….. ……………………………………...…………...… 29
The House ………………………………………..…………… 30
The shoelace ……………………………….…...….………….. 32
16-bit Intel 8088 chip ……………………....…………………. 34
Finish ………………………………………………………….. 35

1
A Smile To Remember

we had goldfish and they circled around and around 1

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!' 5
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. 10

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 15
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 20
there on the kitchen floor and we watched as my mother
smiled

2
Carson McCullers

she died of alcoholism 1

wrapped in a blanket
on a deck chair
on an ocean
steamer. 5

all her books of

terrified loneliness

all her books about

the cruelty
of loveless love 10

were all that was left

of her

as the strolling vacationer

discovered her body

notified the captain 15

and she was quickly dispatched

to somewhere else
on the ship

as everything
continued just 20
as
she had written it

3
Bluebird

there's a bluebird in my heart that 1

wants to get out
but I'm too tough for him,
I say, stay in there, I'm not going
to let anybody see 5
you.
there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I pour whiskey on him and inhale
cigarette smoke 10
and the whores and the bartenders
and the grocery clerks
never know that
he's
in there. 15

there's a bluebird in my heart that

wants to get out
but I'm too tough for him,
I say,
stay down, do you want to mess 20
me up?
you want to screw up the
works?
you want to blow my book sales in
Europe? 25
there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I'm too clever, I only let him out
at night sometimes
when everybody's asleep. 30
I say, I know that you're there,
so don't be
sad.
then I put him back,
but he's singing a little 35
in there, I haven't quite let him
die
and we sleep together like
that
with our 40
secret pact
and it's nice enough to
make a man
weep, but I don't
weep, do 45
you?

4
The Schoolyard of Forever

the schoolyard was a horror show: the bullies, the 1

dragons, the
freaks

the beatings against the wire fence

the eyes of our mates watching 5
glad that they were not the victims
we were beaten well and good
and afterwards
followed
taunted all the way home to our homes of hell 10
full of more beatings

in the schoolyard the bullies ruled well, and in the

restrooms
at the water fountains they owned us and disowned us
but in our way we held 15
never begged for mercy
we took it straight on
silently
we were trained within that horror
a horror that would later hold us in good stead 20
and that came around
as we grew in several ways with time
the bullies gradually began to deflate, lose power

grammar school 25
Jr. high
high school
we grew like odd plants
gathering nourishment
blossoming 30
as then the bullies tried to befriend us
we turned them away

college
where a sun of wildness and power arrived
the bullies melted entirely
we became and they un-became 35

there were new bullies

the professors
who had to be taught something beyond Kant
we glowed madly 40
it was grand and easy
the coeds dismayed at our gamble

5
but we looked beyond them
to a larger fight out there

but when we arrived out there

it was back against the fence again:
new bullies 45
deeply entrenched
almost but not quite worthy
they kept us under for decades
we had to begin all over again
on the streets 50
and in small rooms of madness
it lasted and lasted like that
but our training within horror endured us
and after so very long
we outed 55
oblique to their tantamounts
we found the tunnel at the end of the light

it was a small minority victory

no song of braggadocio
we knew we had won very little against very little 60
that the changing of the clock and the illusions beat
everybody
we clashed against the odds just for the simple sweetness
of it

even now we can still see the janitor with his broom
in his pinstripes and sleeping face 65
we can still see the little girls in their curls
their hair so carefully washed and shining

and the faces of the teachers

fall and folded

the bells of recess 70

the gravel on the baseball diamond
the volleyball net
the sun always up and out
spilling over us like the juice of a giant tangerine

and Herbie Ashcroft 75

his fists coming against us
as we were trapped against the steel fence
as we heard the sounds of automobiles passing but not
stopping
as the world went about doing what it did 80
we asked for no mercy

6
and we returned the next day and the next and the next
the little girls so magic as they sat so upright in their seats
in a room of blackboards and chalk we began badly
but always with a disdain for occurrence 90

which is still embedded

through the ringi-ng of new bells and ways
stuck with that
fixed with that:
a grammar school world 95
even with Herbie Ashcroft dead

7
What Can We Do?

at their best, there is gentleness in Humanity. 1

some understanding and, at times, acts of
courage
but all in all it is a mass, a glob that doesn't
have too much. 5
it is like a large animal deep in sleep and
almost nothing can awaken it.
when activated it's best at brutality,
selfishness, unjust judgments, murder.

what can we do with it, this Humanity? 10

nothing.

avoid the thing as much as possible.

treat it as you would anything poisonous, vicious
and mindless.
but be careful. it has enacted laws to protect 15
itself from you.
it can kill you without cause.
and to escape it you must be subtle.
few escape. 20

it's up to you to figure a plan.

I have met nobody who has escaped.

I have met some of the great and

famous but they have not escaped
for they are only great and famous within 25
Humanity.

I have not escaped

but I have not failed in trying again and
again.

before my death I hope to obtain my 30

life.

8
Alone with Everybody

the flesh covers the bone 1

and they put a mind
in there and
sometimes a soul,
and the women break 5
vases against the walls
and the men drink too
much
and nobody finds the
one 10
but keep
looking
crawling in and out
of beds.
flesh covers 15
the bone and the
flesh searches
for more than
flesh.

there's no chance 20
at all:
we are all trapped
by a singular
fate.

nobody ever finds 25

the one.

the city dumps fill

the junkyards fill
the madhouses fill
the hospitals fill 30
the graveyards fill

nothing else
fills.

9
No Help for That

There is a place in the heart that 1

will never be filled

a space

and even during the

best moments 5
and
the greatest times
times

we will know it

we will know it 10
more than
ever

there is a place in the heart that

will never be filled
and 15

we will wait
and
wait

in that space.

10
We Ain'T Got No Money, Honey, But We Got Rain

call it the greenhouse effect or whatever 1

but it just doesn't rain like
it used to.

I particularly remember the rains of the

depression era. 5
there wasn't any money but there was
plenty of rain.

it wouldn't rain for just a night or

a day,
it would RAIN for 7 days and 7 10
nights
and in Los Angeles the storm drains
weren't built to carry off taht much
water
and the rain came down THICK and 15
MEAN and
STEADY
and you HEARD it banging against
the roofs and into the ground
waterfalls of it came down 20
from roofs
and there was HAIL
big ROCKS OF ICE
bombing
exploding smashing into things 25
and the rain
just wouldn't
STOP
and all the roofs leaked-
dishpans, 30
cooking pots
were placed all about;
they dripped loudly
and had to be emptied
again and 35
again.

the rain came up over the street curbings,

across the lawns, climbed up the steps and
entered the houses.
there were mops and bathroom towels, 40
and the rain often came up through the
toilets:bubbling, brown, crazy,whirling,
and all the old cars stood in the streets,
cars that had problems starting on a
sunny day, 45
and the jobless men stood
11
looking out the windows
at the old machines dying
like living things out there.

the jobless men, 50

failures in a failing time
were imprisoned in their houses with their
wives and children
and their
pets. 55
the pets refused to go out
and left their waste in
strange places.
the jobless men went mad
confined with 60
their once beautiful wives.
there were terrible arguments
as notices of foreclosure
fell into the mailbox.
rain and hail, cans of beans, 65
bread without butter; fried
eggs, boiled eggs, poached
eggs; peanut butter
sandwiches, and an invisible
chicken in every pot. 70

my father, never a good man

at best, beat my mother
when it rained
as I threw myself
between them, 75
the legs, the knees, the
screams
until they
separated.

"I'll kill you," I screamed 80

at him. "You hit her again
and I'll kill you!"

"Get that son-of-a-bitching

kid out of here!"

"no, Henry, you stay with 85

your mother!"

all the households were under

siege but I believe that ours
held more terror than the
average. 90

12
and at night
as we attempted to sleep
the rains still came down
and it was in bed 100
in the dark
watching the moon against
the scarred window
so bravely
holding out 105
most of the rain,
I thought of Noah and the
Ark
and I thought, it has come
again. 110
we all thought
that.

and then, at once, it would

stop.
and it always seemed to 115
stop
around 5 or 6 a.m.,
peaceful then,
but not an exact silence
because things continued to 120
drip
drip
drip

and there was no smog then

and by 8 a.m. 125
there was a
blazing yellow sunlight,
Van Gogh yellow-
crazy, blinding!
and then 130
the roof drains
relieved of the rush of
water
began to expand in the warmth:
PANG!PANG!PANG! 135

and everybody got up and looked outside

and there were all the lawns
still soaked
greener than green will ever
be 140
and there were birds
on the lawn
13
CHIRPING like mad,
they hadn't eaten decently
for 7 days and 7 nights 145
and they were weary of
berries
and
they waited as the worms
rose to the top, 150
half drowned worms.
the birds plucked them
up
and gobbled them
down; there were 155
blackbirds and sparrows.
the blackbirds tried to
drive the sparrows off
but the sparrows,
maddened with hunger, 160
smaller and quicker,
got their
due.

the men stood on their porches

smoking cigarettes, 165
now knowing
they'd have to go out
there
to look for that job
that probably wasn't 170
there, to start that car
that probably wouldn't
start.

and the once beautiful

wives 175
stood in their bathrooms
combing their hair,
applying makeup,
trying to put their world back
together again, 180
trying to forget that
awful sadness that
gripped them,
wondering what they could
fix for 185
breakfast.

and on the radio

we were told that
school was now
open. 190
14
and
soon
there I was
on the way to school,
massive puddles in the 200
street,
the sun like a new
world,
my parents back in that
house, 205
I arrived at my classroom
on time.

Mrs. Sorenson greeted us

with, "we won't have our
usual recess, the grounds 210
are too wet."
"AW!" most of the boys
went.

"but we are going to do

something special at 215
recess," she went on,
"and it will be
fun!"

well, we all wondered

what that would 220
be
and the two hour wait
seemed a long time
as Mrs. Sorenson
went about 225
teaching her
lessons.

I looked at the little

girls, they looked so
pretty and clean and 230
alert,
they sat still and
straight
and their hair was
beautiful 235
in the California
sunshine.

the the recess bells rang

and we all waited for the
fun. 240

15
then Mrs. Sorenson told us:
"now, what we are going to
do is we are going to tell
each other what we did
during the rainstorm! 245
we'll begin in the front row
and go right around!
now, Michael, you're
first!. . ."

well, we all began to tell 250

our stories, Michael began
and it went on and on,
and soon we realized that
we were all lying, not
exactly lying but mostly 255
lying and some of the boys
began to snicker and some
of the girls began to give
them dirty looks and
Mrs.Sorenson said, 260
"all right! I demand a
modicum of silence
here!
I am interested in what
you did 265
during the rainstorm
even if you
aren't!"

so we had to tell our

stories and they were 270
stories.

one girl said that

when the rainbow first
came
she saw God's face 275
at the end of it.
only she didn't say
which end.

one boy said he stuck

his fishing pole 280
out the window
and caught a little
fish
and fed it to his
cat. 285

almost everybody told

16
a lie.
the truth was just
too awful and
embarrassing to tell. 290

then the bell rang

and recess was
over.
"thank you," said Mrs.
Sorenson, "that was very 295
nice.
and tomorrow the grounds
will be dry
and we will put them
to use 300
again."

most of the boys

cheered
and the little girls
sat very straight and 305
still,
looking so pretty and
clean and
alert,
their hair beautiful in a sunshine that 310
the world might never see
again.

17
The Sun Wields Mercy

and the sun wields mercy 1

but like a jet torch carried to high,
and the jets whip across its sight
and rockets leap like toads,
and the boys get out the maps 5
and pin-cushion the moon,
old green cheese,
no life there but too much on earth:
our unwashed India boys
crossing their legs,playing pipes, 10
starving with sucked in bellies,
watching the snakes volute
like beautiful women in the hungry air;
the rockets leap,
the rockets leap like hares, 15
clearing clump and dog
replacing out-dated bullets;
the Chinese still carve
in jade,quietly stuffing rice
into their hunger, a hunger 20
a thousand years old,
their muddy rivers moving with fire
and song, barges, houseboats
pushed by drifting poles
of waiting without wanting; 25
in Turkey they face the East
on their carpets
praying to a purple god
who smokes and laughs
and sticks fingers in their eyes 30
blinding them, as gods will do;
but the rockets are ready: peace is no longer,
for some reason,precious;
madness drifts like lily pads
on a pond circling senselessly; 35
the painters paint dipping
their reds and greens and yellows,
poets rhyme their loneliness,
musicians starve as always
and the novelists miss the mark, 40
but not the pelican , the gull;
pelicans dip and dive, rise,
shaking shocked half-dead
radioactive fish from their beaks;
indeed, indeed, the waters wash 45
the rocks with slime; and on wall st.
the market staggers like a lost drunk
looking for his key; ah,
this will be a good one,by God:
18
it will take us back to the 50
sabre-teeth, the winged monkey
scrabbling in pits over bits
of helmet, instrument and glass;
a lightning crashes across
the window and in a million rooms 55
lovers lie entwined and lost
and sick as peace;
the sky still breaks red and orange for the
painters-and for the lovers,
flowers open as they always have 60
opened but covered with thin dust
of rocket fuel and mushrooms,
poison mushrooms; it's a bad time,
a dog-sick time-curtain
act 3, standing room only, 65
SOLD OUT, SOLD OUT, SOLD OUT again,
by god,by somebody and something,
by rockets and generals and
leaders, by poets , doctors, comedians,
by manufacturers of soup 70
and biscuits, Janus-faced hucksters
of their own indexterity;
I can now see now the coal-slick
contaminated fields, a snail or 2,
bile, obsidian, a fish or 3 75
in the shallows, an obloquy of our
source and our sight.....
has this happened before? is history
a circle that catches itself by the tail,
a dream, a nightmare, 80
a general's dream, a president’s dream,
a dictators dream...
can't we awaken?
or are the forces of life greater than we are?
can't we awaken? must we forever, 85
dear friends, die in our sleep?

19
Splash

the illusion is that you are simply 1

reading this poem.
the reality is that this is
more than a
poem. 5
this is a beggar's knife.
this is a tulip.
this is a soldier marching
through Madrid.
this is you on your 10
death bed.
this is Li Po laughing
underground.
this is not a god-damned
poem. 15
this is a horse asleep.
a butterfly in
your brain.
this is the devil's
circus. 20
you are not reading this
on a page.
the page is reading
you.
feel it? 25
it's like a cobra. it's a hungry eagle circling the room.

this is not a poem. poems are dull,

they make you sleep.

these words force you

to a new 30
madness.

you have been blessed, you have been pushed into a

blinding area of
light.

the elephant dreams 35

with you
now.
the curve of space
bends and
laughs. 40

you can die now.

you can die now as
people were meant to
die:
20
great, 45
victorious,
hearing the music,
being the music,
roaring,
roaring, 50
roaring.

21
Hello how are you

this fear of being what they are: 1

dead.

at least they are not out on the street, they

are careful to stay indoors, those
pasty mad who sit alone before their tv sets, 5
their lives full of canned, mutilated laughter.

their ideal neighborhood

of parked cars
of little green lawns
of little homes 10
the little doors that open and close
as their relatives visit
throughout the holidays
the doors closing
behind the dying who die so slowly 15
behind the dead who are still alive
in your quiet average neighborhood
of winding streets
of agony
of confusion 20
of horror
of fear
of ignorance.

a dog standing behind a fence.

a man silent at the window. 25

22
Death Wants More Death

death wants more death, and its webs are full: 1

I remember my father's garage, how child-like
I would brush the corpses of flies
from the windows they thought were escape-
their sticky, ugly, vibrant bodies 5
shouting like dumb crazy dogs against the glass
only to spin and flit
in that second larger than hell or heaven
onto the edge of the ledge,
and then the spider from his dank hole 10
nervous and exposed
the puff of body swelling
hanging there
not really quite knowing,
and then knowing- 15
something sending it down its string,
the wet web,
toward the weak shield of buzzing,
the pulsing;
a last desperate moving hair-leg 20
there against the glass
there alive in the sun,
spun in white;
and almost like love:
the closing over, 25
the first hushed spider-sucking:
filling its sack
upon this thing that lived;
crouching there upon its back
drawing its certain blood 30
as the world goes by outside
and my temples scream
and I hurl the broom against them:
the spider dull with spider-anger
still thinking of its prey 35
and waving an amazed broken leg;
the fly very still,
a dirty speck stranded to straw;
I shake the killer loose
and he walks lame and peeved 40
towards some dark corner
but I intercept his dawdling
his crawling like some broken hero,
and the straws smash his legs
now waving 45
above his head
and looking
looking for the enemy
and somewhat valiant,
23
dying without apparent pain 50
simply crawling backward
piece by piece
leaving nothing there
until at last the red gut sack
splashes 55
its secrets,
and I run child-like
with God's anger a step behind,
back to simple sunlight,
wondering 60
as the world goes by
with curled smile
if anyone else
saw or sensed my crime

24
Cut While Shaving

It's never quite right, he said, the way people look, 1

the way the music sounds, the way the words are
written.
It's never quite right, he said, all the things we are
taught, all the loves we chase, all the deaths we 5
die, all the lives we live,
they are never quite right,
they are hardly close to right,
these lives we live
one after the other, 10
piled there as history,
the waste of the species,
the crushing of the light and the way,
it's not quite right,
it's hardly right at all 15
he said.

don't I know it? I

answered.

I walked away from the mirror. 20

it was morning, it was afternoon, it was
night

nothing changed
it was locked in place.
something flashed, something broke, something 25
remained.

I walked down the stairway and

into it.

25
Love & Fame & Death

it sits outside my window now 1

like and old woman going to market;
it sits and watches me,
it sweats nervously
through wire and fog and dog-bark 5
until suddenly
I slam the screen with a newspaper
like slapping at a fly
and you could hear the scream
over this plain city, 10
and then it left.

the way to end a poem

like this
is to become suddenly
quiet. 15

26
Marina

majestic, majic 1
infinite
my little girl is
sun
on the carpet- 5
out the door
picking a flower, ha!
an old man,

battle-wrecked,
emerges from his 10
chair
and she looks at me
but only sees
love,
ha!, and I become 15
quick with the world

and love right back

just like I was meant
to do.

27
And the moon and the stars and the world

Long walks at night-- 1

that's what good for the soul:
peeking into windows
watching tired housewives
trying to fight off 5
their beer-maddened husbands.

28
Safe

the house next door makes me 1

sad.
both man and wife rise early and
go to work.
they arrive home in early evening. 5
they have a young boy and a girl.
by 9 p.m. all the lights in the house
are out.
the next morning both man and
wife rise early again and go to 10
work.
they return in early evening.
By 9 p.m. all the lights are
out.

the house next door makes me 15

sad.
the people are nice people, I
like them.

but I feel them drowning.

and I can't save them. 20

they are surviving.

they are not
homeless.

but the price is

terrible. 25

sometimes during the day

I will look at the house
and the house will look at
me
and the house will 30
weep, yes, it does, I
feel it.

29
The House

They are building a house 1

half a block down
and I sit up here
with the shades down
listening to the sounds, 5
the hammers pounding in nails,
thack thack thack thack,
and then I hear birds,
and thack thack thack,
and I go to bed, 10
I pull the covers to my throat;
they have been building this house
for a month, and soon it will have
its people...sleeping, eating,
loving, moving around, 15
but somehow
now
it is not right,
there seems a madness,
men walk on top with nails 20
in their mouths
and I read about Castro and Cuba,
and at night I walk by
and the ribs of the house show
and inside I can see cats walking 25
the way cats walk,
and then a boy rides by on a bicycle
and still the house is not done
and in the morning the men
will be back 30
walking around on the house
with their hammers,
and it seems people should not build houses
anymore,
it seems people should not get married 35
anymore,
it seems people should stop working
and sit in small rooms
on 2nd floors
under electric lights without shades; 40
it seems there is a lot to forget
and a lot not to do,
and in drugstores, markets, bars,
the people are tired, they do not want
to move, and I stand there at night 45
and look through this house and the
house does not want to be built;
through its sides I can see the purple hills
and the first lights of evening,
30
and it is cold 50
and I button my coat
and I stand there looking through the house
and the cats stop and look at me
until I am embarrassed
and move North up the sidewalk 55
where I will buy
cigarettes and beer
and return to my room.

31
The Shoelace

a woman, a 1
tire that’s flat, a
disease, a
desire: fears in front of you,
fears that hold so still 5
you can study them
like pieces on a
chessboard…
it’s not the large things that
send a man to the 10
madhouse. death he’s ready for, or
murder, incest, robbery, fire, flood…
no, it’s the continuing series of small tragedies
that send a man to the
madhouse… 15
not the death of his love
but a shoelace that snaps
with no time left …
The dread of life
is that swarm of trivialities 20
that can kill quicker than cancer
and which are always there -
license plates or taxes
or expired driver’s license,
or hiring or firing, 25
doing it or having it done to you, or
roaches or flies or a
broken hook on a
screen, or out of gas
or too much gas, 30
the sink’s stopped-up, the landlord’s drunk,
the president doesn’t care and the governor’s
crazy.
light switch broken, mattress like a
porcupine; 35
$105 for a tune-up, carburetor and fuel pump at
sears roebuck;
and the phone bill’s up and the market’s
down
and the toilet chain is 40
broken,
and the light has burned out -
the hall light, the front light, the back light,
the inner light; it’s
darker than hell 45
and twice as
expensive.
then there’s always crabs and ingrown toenails
and people who insist they’re
32
your friends; 50
there’s always that and worse;
leaky faucet, christ and christmas;
blue salami, 9 day rains,
50 cent avocados
and purple 55
liverwurst.

or making it
as a waitress at norm’s on the split shift,
or as an emptier of
bedpans, 60
or as a carwash or a busboy
or a stealer of old lady’s purses
leaving them screaming on the sidewalks
with broken arms at the age of 80.

suddenly 65
2 red lights in your rear view mirror
and blood in your
underwear;
toothache, and $979 for a bridge
$300 for a gold 70
tooth,
and china and russia and america, and
long hair and short hair and no
hair, and beards and no
faces, and plenty of zigzag but no 75
pot, except maybe one to piss in
and the other one around your
gut.

with each broken shoelace

out of one hundred broken shoelaces, 80
one man, one woman, one
thing
enters a
madhouse.

so be careful 85
when you
bend over.

33
16-bit Intel 8088 chip

with an Apple Macintosh 1

you can't run Radio Shack programs
in its disc drive.
nor can a Commodore 64
drive read a file 5
you have created on an
IBM Personal Computer.
both Kaypro and Osborne computers use
the CP/M operating system
but can't read each other's 10
handwriting
for they format (write
on) discs in different
ways.
the Tandy 2000 runs MS-DOS but 15
can't use most programs produced for
the IBM Personal Computer
unless certain
bits and bytes are
altered 20
but the wind still blows over
Savannah
and in the Spring
the turkey buzzard struts and
flounces before his 25
hens.

34
 Finish

the hearse comes through the room filled with 1

the beheaded, the disappeared, the living
mad.
the flies are a glue of sticky paste
their wings will not 5
lift.
I watch an old woman beat her cat
with a broom.
the weather is unendurable
a dirty trick by 10
God.
the water has evaporated from the
toilet bowl
the telephone rings without
sound 15
the small limp arm petering against the
bell.
I see a boy on his
bicycle
the spokes collapse 20
the tires turn into
snakes and melt
away.
the newspaper is oven—hot
men murder each other in the streets 25
without reason.
the worst men have the best jobs
the best men have the worst jobs or are
unemployed or locked in
madhouses. 30
I have 4 cans of food left.
air-conditioned troops go from house to
house
from room to room
jailing, shooting, bayoneting 35
the people.
we have done this to ourselves, we
deserve this
we are like roses that have never bothered to
bloom when we should have bloomed and 40
it is as if
the sun has become disgusted with
waiting
it is as if the sun were a mind that has
given up on us. 45
I go out on the back porch
and look across the sea of dead plants
now thorns and sticks shivering in a
windless sky.
35
somehow I’m glad we’re through 50
finished—
the works of Art
the wars
the decayed loves
the way we lived each day. 55
when the troops come up here
I don’t care what they do for
we already killed ourselves
each day we got out of bed.
I go back into the kitchen
spill some hash from a soft 60
can, almost cooked
already
and I sit
eating, looking at my
fingernails.
the sweat comes from behind my 65
ears and I hear the
shooting in the streets and
I chew and wait
without wonder.

36