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Charles Bukowski – The House
THE HOUSE
from “All’s Normal Here” – 1985
They are building a house
half a block down
and I sit up here
with the shades down
listening to the sounds,
the hammers pounding in nails,
thack thack thack thack,
and then I hear birds,
and thack thack thack,
and I go to bed,
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,
but somehow
now
it is not right,
there seems a madness,
men walk on top with nails
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
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
walking around on the house
with their hammers,
and it seems people should not build houses
anymore,
it seems people should not get married
anymore,
it seems people should stop working
and sit in small rooms
on 2nd floors
under electric lights without shades;
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
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,
and it is cold
and I button my coat
and I stand there looking through the house
and the cats stop and look at me
until I am embarrased
and move North up the sidewalk
where I will buy
cigarettes and beer
and return to my room.
Charles Bukowski – How Is Your Heart
window, Hanku by Christopher Lawrence
Thank you Bukowski on Wry
Charles Bukowski – Laughing Heart
illustration 9
ants loud enough
close to his head,
reprieve of summer cool
as he lay under his cart
pushed for close to a mile
finding geography
awkward to place
despite being his city once,
his mind a squoze larvae
thoughts brief as a snakes hiss,
irritable tongue of weeds,
lying still
close to impossible,
underpass old concrete walls
tagged by youth
more used to shooting than talking
overhead cars heat and horses,
smells nasal reverberations
he would feel quieter
if at the bottom of a lake
where on it’s silted bed
with fishes as companions
devouring algae from his closed eyes,
heat would be gone
and his mind would make sense,
the moon did not bring night rain,
eventually he stood
rocking on heels
than began to walk
this time he would find the start
of his journey
Charles Bukowski – Last Straw
Charles Bukowski one of his last readings in 1980