a poem is a city filled with streets and sewers
\nfilled with saints, heroes, beggars, madmen,
\nfilled with banality and booze,
\nfilled with rain and thunder and periods of
\ndrought, a poem is a city at war,
\na poem is a city asking a clock why,
\na poem is a city burning,
\na poem is a city under guns
\nits barbershops filled with cynical drunks,
\na poem is a city where God rides naked
\nthrough the streets like Lady Godiva,
\nwhere dogs bark at night, and chase away
\nthe flag; a poem is a city of poets,
\nmost of them quite similar
\nand envious and bitter…
\na poem is this city now,
\n50 miles from nowhere,
\n9:09 in the morning,
\nthe taste of liquor and cigarettes,
\nno police, no lovers, walking the streets,
\nthis poem, this city, closing its doors,
\nbarricaded, almost empty,
\nmournful without tears, aging without pity,
\nthe hardrock mountains,
\nthe ocean like a lavendar flame,
\na moon destitute of greatness,
\na small music from broken windows…<\/p>\n
a poem is a city, a poem is a nation,
\na poem is the world…<\/p>\n
and now I stick this under glass
\nfor the mad editor’s scrutiny,
\nand night is elsewhere
\nand faint gray ladies stand in line,
\ndog follows dog to estuary,
\nthe trumpets bring on the gallows
\nas small men rant at things
\nthey cannot do.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
the young man on the bus stop bench<\/strong><\/p>\n he sits all day at the bus stop I remember my own youthful days life becomes difficult: as I drive past today when I drove past again the bench still sits there on the corner <\/p>\n advice for some young man in the year 2064 A.D.<\/strong><\/p>\n let me speak as a friend be careful less the onion blind the eye dismiss perfection as an ache of the and remember <\/p>\n By Charles Bukowski<\/strong>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":119,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19457","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/119"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19457"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19457\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nat Sunset and Western
\nhis sleeping bag beside him.
\nhe’s dirty.
\nnobody bothers him.
\npeople leave him alone.
\nthe police leave him alone.
\nhe could be the 2nd coming of Christ
\nbut I doubt it.
\nthe soles of his shoes are completely
\ngone.
\nhe just laces the tops up
\nand sits and watches traffic.<\/p>\n
\n(although I traveled lighter)
\nthey were similar:
\npark benches
\nstreet corners
\ntarpaper shacks in Georgia for
\n$1.25 a week
\nnot wanting the skid row church
\nhand-outs
\ntoo crazy to apply for relief
\ndaytimes spent laying in public parks
\nbugs in the grass biting
\nlooking into the sky
\nlittle insects whirling above my head
\nthe breathing of white air
\njust breathing and waiting.<\/p>\n
\nbeing ignored
\nand ignoring.
\neverything turns into white air
\nthe head fills with white air
\nand as invisible women sit in rooms
\nwith successful bright-eyed young men
\nconversing brilliantly about everything
\nyour sex drive
\nvanishes and it really
\ndoesn’t matter.
\nyou don’t want food
\nyou don’t want shelter
\nyou don’t want anything.
\nsometimes you die
\nsometimes you don’t.<\/p>\n
\nthe young man on the bus stop bench
\nI am comfortable in my automobile
\nI have money in two different banks
\nI own my own home
\nbut he reminds me of my young self
\nand I want to help him
\nbut I don’t know what to do.<\/p>\n
\nhe was gone
\nI suppose finally the world wasn’t
\npleased with him being there.<\/p>\n
\nadvertising something.<\/p>\n
\nalthough the centuries hang
\nbetween us and neither you nor I
\ncan see the moon<\/p>\n
\nor the snake sting
\nor the beetle posses the house
\nor the lover your wife
\nor the government your child
\nor the wine your will
\nor the doctor your heart
\nor the butchers your belly
\nor the cat your chair
\nor the lawyer your ignorance of the law
\nor the law dressed as a uniformed man and killing you.<\/p>\n
\ngreedy
\nbut do not give in to the mass modesty of
\neasy perfection.<\/p>\n
\nthe belly of the whale is laden with
\ngreat men.<\/p>\n![\"buk\"](\"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/01\/buk.jpg\")
\nABOUT THE AUTHOR<\/strong>
\nCharles Bukowski<\/a> was “the ultimate outsider poet” (Alan Kaufman) “a solitary man and a courageous writer” (Spike Magazine<\/em>), “a major-league tosspot” (The New York Times<\/em>) and “a jerk” (Nick Cave). He once, admirably, made up a quote from Jean Genet that he was “America’s greatest poet.” Following Canongate’s reissue of The Pleasures of the Damned: Poems, 1951-1993<\/em><\/a> and the biography ![\"buk1\"](\"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/01\/buk1-150x150.jpg\")
a poem is this city now,
\n50 miles from nowhere,
\n9:09 in the morning,
\nthe taste of liquor and cigarettes,
\nno police, no lovers, walking the streets,
\nthis poem, this city, closing its doors,
\nbarricaded, almost empty,
\nmournful without tears, aging without pity,
\nthe hardrock mountains,
\nthe ocean like a lavendar flame,
\na moon destitute of greatness,
\na small music from broken windows…<\/p>\n