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the goddamned post office. But even here, like this, you have a
minor chance. Just get those twelve monkey's fucking. If you'd been
born a camel boy in Arabia you wouldn't even have this chance. So
get your back up and get those monkeys at it. You've been blessed
with a minor talent and you're not in India where probably two
dozen boys could write you under if they knew how to write. Well,
maybe not two dozen, maybe just a round dozen.
I finish the half-pint, drink half bottle of wine, go to bed,
forget it.
The next morning at nine a.m. the doorbell rings. There is a
young black girl standing there with a stupid-looking white guy in
rimless glasses. They tell me that I have made a promise to go boat-
ing with them at a party three nights ago. I get dressed, get into the
car with them. They drive to an apartment and a black-haired kid
met him at a party. He passes out little orange life-belts. Next I
know we're down at the pier. I can't tell the pier from the water.
They help me down a swinging wooden contraption that leads to a
floating dock. The bottom of the contraption and the dock are
about three feet apart. They help me down.
"What the fuck is this?" I ask. "Does anybody have a drink?"
I am with the wrong people. Nobody has a drink. Then I am in a
small rowboat, rented, and somebody has attached a half-horse-
power motor. The bottom of the boat is filled with water and two
dead fish. I don't know who the people are. They know me. Fine,
fine. We head out to sea. I vomit. We pass a suckerfish wrapped
around a flying monkey. No, that's terrible. I vomit again.
"How's the great writer?" asks the stupid-looking guy in the
prow of the boat, the guy with the rimless galsses.
"What a great writer?" asks the stupid-looking guy in the
prow of the boat, the guy with the rimless glasses.
"What great writer?" I ask, thinking he is talking about Rim-
baud, although I never thought Rimbaud a great writer.
"You," he says.
"Me?" I say, "Oh, fine. Think I'm going to Greece next year."
"Grease?" he says. "You mean up your ass?"
"No," I answer, "up yours."
We head out to sea where Conrad made it. To hell with Con-
rad. I'll take coke with bourbon in a dark bedroom in Hollywood in
1970, or whatever year you read this. The year of the monkey-orgy
that never happened. The motor flits and gnashes at the sea; we
plunge on toward Ireland. No, it's the Pacific. We plunge on toward
Japan. To hell with it.
===
10 jackoffs
old Sanchez is a genius but I am the only one who knows it
and it's always good to go see him. there are very few people I can
stay in a room with more than 5 minutes without feeling gutted.
Sanchez passes my tests, and I am very test, hehehehe, oh my god,
anyhow, I go to see him now and then in his hand-built two story
shack. he installed his own plumbing, has a free-feed line from a
high-power voltage line, has connected himself up a telephone which
feeds underground from a neighbor's installation, but he explains to
me that he cannot call long distance or out of the city without
exposing his sycophancy. he even lives with a young woman who
says very little, paints, walks about looking sexy and makes love to
him and him to her, of course. he bought the ground for very little
and although the place is some distance from Los Angeles, you
might call this an advantage. he sits among wires, popular mechanics
magazines, tape recording sets, shelves and shelves of books on all
subjects. he is concise, never rude; he is humorous and magic, he
writes very well but is not interested in fame, once in a great while
he will come out from his cave and read his poetry at some university,
and
it is said that the walls and the ivy tremble and shake for weeks
afterwards along with the co-eds, he has taped 10,000 tapes of con-
versation, sounds, music-dull and undull, usual and otherwise.
the walls are covered with photos, advertisements, drawings, hunks
of rock, snake skins, skulls, dried rubbers, soot, silver and spots of
golddust.
"I'm afraid I'm cracking," I tell him, "eleven years on the
same job, the hours dragging over me like wet shit, wow, and all the
faces melted down to zeros, yapping, laughing at nothing. I'm no
snob, Sanchez, but sometimes it gets to be a real horror show and
the only end is death or madness."
"sanity is an imperfection," he says, dropping a couple of pills
into his mouth. "jesus, I mean, I'm taught at several universities,
some prof is
writing a book on me- I've been translated into several lan-
guages-"
"we all have. you're getting old, Bukowski, you're weakening.
keep your moxie. Victory or Death."
"Adolph."
"Adolph."
"large gamble, large loss."
"right, or invert it for the common man."
"well, fuck."
"yeah."
"it gets quiet for a while, then he says, "you can come live with
us."
"thanks, sure, man. but I think I'll try a little more moxie
first."
"your game."
"Over his head is a black sign upon which he has pasted in white
type:
KIM."
-Dutch Schultz, on his deathbed.
WITH ME, GRAND OPERA IS THE BERRIES."
-Al Capone
"NE CRAIGNEZ POINT, MONSIEUR, LE TORTURE."
-Leibnetz.
"THERE IS NO MORE."
-Motto of Sitting Bull
"THE POLICEMAN'S CLIENT IS THE ELECTRIC CHAIR."
-George Jessel.
"FAST AND LOOSE IN ONE THING,
FAST AND LOOSE IN EVERYTHING.
I NEVER KNEW IT FAIR. NO MORE
WILL YOU, NOR NO ONE.
-Detective Bucket.
"AMEN IS THE INFLUENCE OF NUMBERS."
-Pico Della Mirandola,
in his kabbalistic conclusions
"SUCCESS AS THE RESULT OF INDUSTRY IS A PEAS-
ANT IDEAL."
-Wallace Stevens
"TO ME, MY SHIT STINKS BETTER EXCEPT THAN A
DOG'S."
-Charles Bukowski.
"NOW THE PORNOGRAPHERS WERE ASSEMBLED WITH
IN THE CREMATORIUM."
-Anthony Bloomfield.
"ADAGE OF SPONTANEITY - THE BACHELOR GRINDS
HIS CHOCOLATE HIMSELF."
-Marcel Duchamp.
"KISS THE HAND YOU CANNOT SEVER."
-Taureg saying.
"WE ALL, IN OUR DAY, WERE SMART FELLOWS."
-Admiral St. Vincent.
"MY DREAM IS TO SAVE THEM FROM NATURE."
-Christian Dior.
"OPEN SESAME - I WANT OUT."
-Stanislas Jerzy Lec.
"A YARDSTICK DOES NOT SAY THAT
THE OBJECT TO BE MEASURED
IS ONE YARD LONG."
-Ludwig Wittgenstein.
I am a bit gone on beer. "Say, I like that last one: "the object
to be murdered does not have to be a yard long."
"I think that's even better but it's not what is said."
"all right. how's Kaakaa? that's baby-language for shit, and a
more sexy woman I've never seen.
"I know. and it started with Kafka. she used to like Kafka and
I called her that. then she changed it herself." he gets up and walks
to a photo. "come 'ere, Bukowski." I flip my beercan into the
trashcan and walk on over. "what's this?" asks Sanchez.
I look at the photo. it is a very good photo.
"well, it looks like a cock."
"what kind of cock?"
" a stiff cock, a big one."
"it's mine."
"so?"
"don't you notice?"
"what?"
"the sperm."
"yes, I see it. I didn't want to say-"
"why not? what the hell's wrong with you?"
"I don't understand."
"I mean, do you see the sperm or don't you?"
"what do you mean?"
"I mean, I'm JACKING OFF, can't you understand how hard
that is to do?"
"it's not hard, Sanchez, I do it all the time-"
"oh, you ox! I mean I had the camera rigged-up with a string.
Do you realize what an enactment it was to remain quietly in focus,
ejaculate and trigger the camera at the same time?"
"I don't use a camera."
"how many men do? you miss the point, as usual. who the hell
you are translated into the German, the Spanish, the French and so
forth, I'll never know! look, do you realize that it took me THREE
DAYS to make this SIMPLE photograph? do you know how many
times I had to JACKOFF?"
"4 times?"
"TEN TIMES!"
"oh, Lord! how about Kaakaa?"
"she liked the photo."
"I mean-"
"good god, boy, I don't have the tongue to answer your sim-
plicity."
He goes on around back there and plops himself in his chair
again. among his wires and pliers and translations and his huge BIT-
TER-LEAP notebook, Adolph's nose glued to the black front with
edgeworks of the Berlin bunker in the background.
"I'm working on something now," I tell him, "short about me
walking in to interview the great composer. he's drunk. I get drunk,
there's a maid. we're on the wine. he leans forward and tells me,
'The Meek Shall Inherit the Earth,'-"
"yeah?"
"and then he says, 'translated that means that the stupid have
the greatest persistency.'"
"kind of lousy." he says, "but it's all right for you."
"but I don't know what to do with the story. I've got the
maid walking around in a very short thing and I don't know what to do
with it. I thought I might save the story by whiplashing the maid
with my belt buckle and then sucking the composer's dick. but I've
never sucked dick, never felt like it, I'm square, so I left the story
in
the center and never finished it."
"every man is a homo, a dick-sucker; every woman is a dyke,
why do you worry so much?"
"because if I'm happy I'm no good and I don't want to be
no good."
We sit there a while and then she comes from upstairs, the
flaxen straight string hair.
it's the first woman I could eat, I think.
but she walks past Sanchez and his tongue licks his lips just a bit,
she walks past me like separate ball-bearings of magic wavering crazy
flesh, may the heavens kiss my balls if it is not so, and she waves
through it all glorious as avalanche smashed by sun-
"hello, Hank," she says.
"Kaakaa," I laugh.
she goes behind her table and begins her bits of painting and
he sits there, Sanchez, beard blacker than black power, but calm
calm, no claims. I begin to get drunk, say nasty things, say anything.
then I begin to get dull. I mumble, I murmur. "Oh, sorry- ta spoil
yr evening-so sorry, fuckers- ya-I'm a killer but I won't
kill anybody. I got class. I'm Bukowski! translated into SEVEN
LANGUAGES! I AM the ONE! BUKOWSKI!"
I fall forward trying to look at the jackoff picture again, pitch
over something. it is one of my own shoes. I have this god damn bad
habit of taking off my own shoes.
"Hank," she says, "be careful."
"Bukowski?" he asks, "You all right?"
he lifts me up. "man, I think you better stay here tonight."
"NO GOD DAMN IT, I'M GOING TO THE WOOD-
CHOPPERS BALL!"
next thing I know he's got me over his shoulder, Sanchez has
and he's carrying me to his upstairs pad, you know, where he and
his woman do the thing, and then I'm down on the bed, he's gone.
door closed, and then I hear some kind of music downstairs, and
laughter, the both of them, but kind laughter, no malice, and I did
not know what to do, one did not expect the best, luck or people
everybody failed you finally, well, and then the door opened, a pop
of light, and there was Sanchez -
"hey, Bubu, a bottle of good French wine-sip it slowly, do
you most good. you'll sleep. be happy. I won't say we love you,
that's too easy. and if you want to come downstairs, dance and sing,
talk, o.k. do what you want. here's the wine."
he hands me the bottle. I lift it like some crazy cornet, again
and again. through a ripped curtain a part of the worn moon leaps. it
is a perfectly good night; it is not jail; it is far from that-
in the morning when I awaken, go down to piss, come out
from pissing, I find them both asleep on that narrow couch hardly
enough for one body, but they are not one body and their faces
together and asleep their bodies together and asleep, why be
corny??? I only feel the tiny clutch at the throat, the automatic
transmission blues of loveliness, that somebody has it, that they
don't even hate me-that they even wish me what?-
I walk out staunching and griefing and feeling and sick and
blue and bukowski, old, starlit sun, my god, reaching into the final
corner, the last midnight blast, cold Mr. C., big H, Mary Mary, clean
as a bug on the wall, the heat of December a brainweb across my
everlasting spine, Mercy like Kerouac's dead baby sprawled across
Mexican railroad tracks in the everlasting July of suck-off tombs, I
maybe writing this down by myself, leaving a few things out (I have
been threatened by various powerful forces for doing things that are
only normal and gaga gladful to do)
and I get into my eleven year old car
and now I have driven away
find myself here
and write you here a little illegal story of
love
beyond myself
but, perhaps, understandable to
you.
yours truly,
Sanchez and Bukowski
p.s. - this time the Heat missed. don't keep more than you
can swallow: love, heat or hate.
===
3chickens
Vicki was all right, but we had our troubles. we were on the
wine. port, that woman would get drunk and get to talking and she
would make up some of the vilest imaginable stuff about me. and
that tone of voice. shoddy and lisping and grating and insane. it
would get to any man. it got to me.
once she was screaming these insanities from the fold-down
bed in our apartment. I begged her to stop. but she wouldn't. finally,
I just walked over, lifted up the bed with her in it and folded
everything into the wall.
then I went over and sat down and listened to her scream.
but she kept screaming so I walked over and pulled the bed
out of the wall again there she lay, holding her arm, claiming it was
broken.
"your arm can't be broken," I said.
"it is, it is. oh, you slimy jackoff bastard, you've broken my
arm!"
I had some more drinks but she just kept holding her arm and
whining. I finally had enough and telling her I'd be right back I went
downstairs and outside and found some old wooden boxes behind a
grocery store. I found good sturdy slats, ripped them off, pulled out
the nails, got back on the elevator and rode back to our apartment.
it took about 4 slats. I bound them around her arm with
rippings from one of her dresses. she quieted down for a couple of
hours. then she started in again. I couldn't take it anymore. so I
called a taxi, we went to the General Hospital, as soon as the taxi
left
I took the boards off and threw them into the street. then they
x-rayed her CHEST and put her arm in a cast. can you imagine that?
I suppose if she broke her head they'd x-ray her ass.
anyhow, she used to sit in the bars after that and say, "I am
the only woman who has been folded into a wall in a wall bed."
and I wasn't so sure of THAT either, but I let her go on saying it.
now, another time she angered me and I slapped her but it was
across the mouth and it broke her false teeth.
I was surprised that it broke her false teeth. and I went out
and got this super cement glue and I glued her teeth together for her.
it worked for a while and then one night as she sat there drinking her
wine she suddenly had a mouthful of broken teeth.
that wine was so strong it undid the glue. it was disgusting. we
had to get her some new teeth. how we did it, I don't quite remem-
ber, but she claimed they made her look like a horse.
we'd usually always have these arguments after we drank
awhile, and Vicki claimed I'd get very mean when I was drunk but I
think that she was the one who was mean. anyhow, sometime during
the argument she'd get up, slam the door and run outside to some
bar. "looking for a live one," as the girls would say.
it always made me feel bad when she left. I've got to admit it.
sometimes she wouldn't come back for 2 or 3 days. and nights. it
wasn't a very nice thing to do.
one time she ran out and I sat there drinking the wine, think-
ing about it. then I got up and found the elevator and rode on down
to the streets too. I found her in her favorite bar. she sat there
holding a kind of purple scarf. I'd never seen the purple scarf before.
holding out on me. I walked up to her and said quite loudly:
"I've tried to make a woman out of you but you're nothing
but a god damned whore!"
the bar was full. every seat taken. I lifted my hand. I swung. I
backhanded her off that god damned stool. she fell to the floor and
screamed.
this was at the back end of the bar. I didn't even turn to look
at her. I walked the length of the bar to the exit. then I turned and
faced the crowd. it was very quiet.
"now," I said to them, "if there's anybody here who doesn't
LIKE what I just did, just SAY something-"
it was quieter than quiet.
I turned around and walked out the doorway. the moment I
hit the street I could hear them babbling and buzzing in there, buzzing
and babbling.
the SHITS! not a man in the boatload!
- but, of course, she came back, and, well, anyhow to get on,
this one night lately we are sitting around drinking the wine and the
same old arguments started. this time I decided to go.
I'M GONNA GET THE FUCK OUTA THIS HOLE!" I yelled
at Vicki. "I CAN'T STAND NO MORE OF YOUR GOD DAMNED
ABUSE!"
she jumped in front of the door.
"over my dead body, that's the only way you are getting out
of here!
"o.k., if that's the way it's gotta be."
I slammed her a good one and she fell down in front of the
doorway. I had to move her body to get out.
I took the elevator down. feeling rather good. a good jaunty
4-floor ride down. the elevator was kind of a cage-like contraption
and smelled like old stockings, old gloves, old dustmops, but it gave
me a feeling of security and power - somehow - and the wine rode
all through me.
but then I got outside and had a change of mind. I went to the
liquor store. bought 4 more bottles of wine and went back to my
place and rode the elevator back up. the same feeling of security and
power. I walked into my place. Vicki was sitting in a chair crying.
"I've come back to you, you lucky darling," I told her.
"you bastard, you hit me. YOU HIT ME!"
"umm, I said, opening a new bottle. "and you give me any
more shit and I'll hit you again."
"YEAH!" she screamed, "YOU'D HIT ME BUT YOU
WOULDN'T HAVE ENOUGH GUTS TO HIT A MAN!"
"HELL NO!" I screamed back, "I WOULDN'T HIT A MAN!
YOU THINK I'M CRAZY? WHAT'S THAT GOT TO DO WITH
IT?"
that settled her for a bit and we sat for a bit and we sat
drinking down the waterglassfuls of wine, port.
then she started in on her abusive stuff again, mostly claiming
I jacked off while she was asleep.
well, even if it were true I figured that was my business and if
it wasn't, then she was REALLY crazy. she claimed I jacked off in
the bathtub, in the closet, in the elevator, everywhere.
everytime I got out of the tub she'd run into the bathroom,
like:
"there! I SEE IT! LOOK AT IT!"
"you crazy bat, that's just the dirt-ring."
"no, that's "COME! that's COME!"
or she'd run in while I was bathing under the arms or between
the legs and say, "see, see, SEE! you're DOING IT!"
"doing WHAT? can't a man wash his BALLS? those are MY
balls, god damn you! can't a man wash his own balls?"
"what's that thing sticking up there?"
"my left index finger. now get the HELL OUT OF HERE!!!"
or in bed, I'd be sound asleep and all of a sudden this hand
grabbing my string and nuggets, man, sound asleep in the middle of
the night, these FINGERNAILS!
"AH HA! I CAUGHT YOU! I CAUGHT YOU!"
"you crazy bat, the next time you do that I SWEAR I AM
GOING TO KILL YOU!"
"for christ's sake, go to sleep-"
so this night she just sat there screaming her jackoff accusa-
tions. I just sat there and drank my wine and didn't deny anything.
this made her angry, angrier.
and angrier.
finally she couldn't stand it, all her talk about jackingoff, I
mean ME supposedly jackingoff and me just sitting there smiling at
her, and she jumped up and ran out the door.
I let her go. I sat there and drank my wine, port.
same old stuff.
I thought it over, umm, umm, well.
then very leisurely I got up and took the elevator down,same
old feeling of power. I was not angry. I was very calm. it was just the
same old war.
I walked on down the street but I didn't go to her favorite bar.
why repeat the same play? you are a whore; I tried to make a
woman out of you. balls. after a while a man could get to sounding
pretty silly. so I went to another bar and sat down on a stool near the
door. I ordered a drink and took a slug, set the timing down, and then
I saw her. Vicki. she was at the other end of the bar. for some reason
she looked scared shitless.
but I didn't go on down. I just stared at her as if I didn't know
her.
then I noticed something next to me in one of those old
fashioned fox furs. the dead fox's head hung down over her breast
looking at me. the breast looked at me.
"your fox looks like it needs a drink, sweetie" I told her.
"it's dead; it don't need a drink. I need a drink or I'm gonna
die."
well, a nice guy like me. who am I to spread death? I bought
her a drink, her name, she told me, was Margy. I told her that I was
Thomas Nightengale, shoesalesman. Margy. all these women with
names, drinking, crapping, having monthlies. fucking men. getting
folded into walls. it was too much.
we had a coupla more, and already she was in her purse, flash-
ing the photo of her children, an ugly demented boy and a girl
without any hair, they were in some dull place in Ohio, the father had
understanding. oh, one of THOSE? and he brought these women in
the house and screwed them in front of her with all the lights on.
"ah, I see, I see," I said. "yes, of course, most men are beasts,
they simply do not understand. and you're SUCH a sweetie, what
the hell, it ain't right."
I suggested we go to another bar. Vicki's ass was twitching and
she was half Indian.
we left her there. we went around the corner. we had one
around the corner.
then I suggested we go to my place. do a little eating. I mean,
get something to cook, bake, fry.
I didn't tell her about Vicki, of course. but Vicki always
prided herself on her god damned baked chickens. maybe it was
because she looked like one. a baked chicken with horse teeth.
so I suggested we get a chicken, bake it, bathe it in whiskey.
she did not demur.
so. liquor store. 5th of whiskey. 5 or 6 quarts of beer.
we found an all night market. the place even had a butcher.
"we wanta bake a chicken," I said.
"oh, christ," he said.
I dropped one of the quarts of beer. it really exploded.
"christ," he said.
I dropped another to see what he would say.
"oh, jesus," he said.
"I want THREE CHICKENS," I said.
"THREE CHICKENS?" "jesus christ, yes," I said.
the butcher reached in and got three very white-yellow chick-
ens with a few long black unplucked hairs that looked like human
hairs on them and he wrapped them all up a big big bundle, all in
pink tough paper with this real gripping tape, and I paid him and we
got out of there.
I dropped 2 more quarts of beer on the way.
I rode up the elevator, feeling my power rising. when we got
inside my door I lifted Margy's dress to see what was holding her
stockings up. then I gave her a big chummy whiskey-goose with
long-finger right hand. she screamed and dropped the big pink bun-
dle. it fell on the rug and the 3 chickens came out. those 3 chickens,
all white-yellow with their 29 or 30 drooling dropping murdered
human hairs sticking to them looked very strange gaping there on
that worn rug of yellow and brown flowers and trees and Chinese
dragons, under electric lights in los angeles at the end of the world
near 6th street under Union.
"oooh, the chickens."
"fuck the chickens."
her garter belt was dirty. it was perfect. I goosed her again.
well, shit, so I sat down and peeled the whiskey bottle, poured
a couple of tall waterglasses full, took off my shoes stockings pants
shirt, took one of her cigarettes. sat in my underwear. I always do
that, right away. I like to be comfortable.. if the broad don't like
it,
fuck her. she can go. but they always stay. I got a manner. some
broads say I should have been a king. others say other things. fuck
'em.
she drank most of her drink and started for her purse. "I have
some children in Ohio. they're lovely children-"
"forget that. we've been through that stage. tell me, do you
suck dick?"
"what do you mean?"
"OH, BALLS!" I smashed my glass against the wall.
then I got another one, filled it up, and we drank some more.
I don't know how long we worked on the whiskey but it must
have gotten to me because the next thing I know I was laying on the
bed naked. staring up at the electric light and Margy was standing
there naked and she was rubbing my penis quite rapidly with her fox
fur. and while she was rubbing she was saying over and over, "I am
going to fuck you, I am going to fuck you-"
"listen," I said. "I don't know if you can fuck me. I jacked-off
in the elevator earlier this evening. I think it was about 8 o'clock."
"I will fuck you anyhow."
she really speeded up that fox fur. it was all right. maybe I
could get one for myself. I once knew a guy who put raw liver in a
long drinking glass and screwed that. me, I didn't like to stick my
thing into anything that could break or slice. imagine going to a
doctor with a bloody cock and saying it happened while screwing a
water glass. once while I was bumming in a small town in Texas I
saw this well-built wonderful fuck of a young broad married to this
little shriveled up old dwarf with a nasty disposition and some kind of
malady that made him trembly all over. she supported him and
pushed him around in a wheelchair, and I used to think of him
pouncing on all that good meat. I'd get a picture of it, you know,
and then finally I got the story. when she had been a younger girl
she had gotten this coke bottle stuck all the way into her snatch and
just couldn't get the thing out and had to go to a doctor. he got it
out, and somehow the story got out. she was ruined in that town
after that, and didn't have sense enough to get out. nobody wanted
her except the nasty dwarf with the shakes. he didn't give a damn -
he had the best piece of ass in town.
where was I? oh, yeah.
her fox fur went faster and faster and I finally got something
going just as I heard a key go into the door. oh, shit, it was probably
Vicki!
well, it's simple, I thought. I'll just boot her ass out and go
about my business.
the door opened and there stood Vicki with 2 cops standing
behind her.
"GET THAT WOMAN OUT OF MY HOUSE!" she screamed.
COPS! I couldn't believe it. I pulled the sheet over my pulsa-
ting and throbbing and giant sexual organ and pretended to be
asleep. it looked like I had a cucumber under there.
Margy was screaming back: "I know you, Vicki, this ain't your
god damned house! this guy EARNS his way by licking your asshole
hairs! he gets you babbling to heaven in Morse code with that long
sandpaper tongue of his, you're nothing but a WHORE, a true
blue turdy-gulping 2-dollar whore. and THAT went out with Franky
D., and you were 48 THEN!"
hearing that, my cucumber went down. both of these broads
must have been 80 years old. singly, that is, together they might
have reached back to suck-off Abe Lincoln, something like that.
suck-off General Robert E. Lee, Patrick Henry. Mozart. Dr. Samuel
Johnson. Robespierre. Napoleon. Machiavelli? wine preserves. God
endures. the whores blow on.
and Vicki screamed back: "WHO'S A WHORE? WHO'S A
WHORE, HUH? YOU'RE A WHORE, THAT'S WHO! YOU'VE
BEEN SELLING THAT CLAPPED HOLE OF YOURS UP AND
DOWN ALVARADO STREET FOR 30 YEARS! A BLIND RAT
WOULD BACK UP 4 TIMES IF HE RAN INTO THERE ONCE!
AND YOU HOLLERING 'POW! POW!' WHEN YOU'RE LUCKY
ENOUGH TO GET A GUY TO COME! AND THAT WENT OUT
WHEN CONFUCIUS FUCKED HIS MOTHER!"
"WHY YOU CHEAP BITCH. YOU'VE GIVEN OUT MORE
BLUE BALLS THAN A SILVER CHRISTMAS TREE IN DISNEY-
LAND. WHY YOU-"
"listen, ladies," said one of the cops. "I will have to ask you to
watch your remarks and lower the volume. understanding and kind-
ness are the keynotes of Democratic thought. oh, I just DO love the
way Bobby Kennedy wears that tickling blobbing knot of raunchy
hair over one side of his darling head don't you just?"
"why you fuckin' queer," said Margy, "is that why you wear
them tight pants, to make your asshole sweeter? god, it DOES look
NICE! I'd kinda like to do you in myself. I see you shits bending
over into car windows giving out tickets on the freeways and I
always feel like pinching your tight little asses."
the cop suddenly got a brilliant flare in his dead eyes, he
unhitched his club and tapped Margy along the side of the neck with
it. she fell to the floor.
then he slipped the bracelets on her. I could hear those clicks,
and the bastards ALWAYS snapped them too tight. but they felt
almost GOOD once you got them on. kind of forceful and heavy and
you felt like Christ or something dramatic.
I kept my eyes closed so I couldn't see whether they threw a
robe or something over her.
then the cop who snapped the bracelets said to the other cop,
"I'll take her on the elevator. we'll go on the elevator."
and I couldn't hear very well, but I listened as they went
down, and I heard Margy screaming, "oooooh, oooooooh, you bas-
tard. let go of me, let go of me!"
and he kept saying, "shut up, shut up, shut up! you're only
getting what you deserve! and you haven't seen ANYTHING yet!
this-is just the-beginning!"
then she really screamed.
then the other cop walked over to me. through one narrowed
eye I could see him put his big black shiny shoe up on the mattress,
up on the sheet.
he looked down at me.
"is this guy a fag? he looks like a fag, sure as hell."
"I don't' THINK he is. he might be. he can sure ball a broad,
though."
"you want me to run him in?" he asked Vicki.
I had my eyes closed. it was a long wait. god, it was a long
wait. that big foot there on my sheets. the electric light shining
down.
then she spoke. finally. "no, he's-.o.k. leave him there."
the cop took his foot down. I heard him walk across the room,
then wait at the door. he spoke to Vicki:
"I'm going to have to charge you 5 bucks more for your
protection next month. you're getting a bit harder to watch out
for."
then he was gone. I mean, out into the hall. I waited for him
to get into the elevator. I heard it go down to the first floor. I
counted to 64. then, I LEAPED OUT OF BED.
my nostrils were flaring like Gregory Peck in heat.
"YOU ROTTEN BITCH. YOU EVER DO THAT AGAIN
AND I'M GOING TO KILL YOU!"
"NO, NO, NO!!!"
I raised my hand to give her the old backhand.
"I TOLD HIM NOT TO TAKE YOU!" she screamed at me.
"ummm. that's right. I've got to consider that."
I lowered my hand.
then there was some whiskey left and some wine too. I got up
and put the chain on the door.
we turned off the lights and sat there and drank and smoked
and talked about things. this, and that, easy and casual, then, like
old times, we looked at the same red horse that flew and flew in red
neon on the side of a building just downtown to our east. it flew and
flew on the side of this building all night. no matter what happened.
you know what it was, a kind of red horse with red wings of neon.
but I told you that. a winged horse. anyhow, like always, we count-
ed: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. the wings always flapped 7
times. then the horse, everything, stood still, then, it started again.
our whole apartment would be in this red glow. then when the horse
stopped flying, somehow things would get white for a flash. I don't
know why. I think that it was caused by an advertisement beneath
the red winged horse. it said, some kind of product, buy this or buy
that, in this WHITE. anyhow.
we sat and talked and drank and smoked.
later we went to bed together. she kissed very nicely, her
tongue was kind of an apologetic sadness.
then we fucked. we fucked as the red horse flew.
7 times the wings flapped.. and in the center of the rug the 3
chickens were still there. watching. the chickens turned red, the
chickens turned white. 14 times they turned red. then they
turned white. 21 times they turned red. then they turned white. 28
times-
it had ended a better night than most.
===
3women
we lived right across from McArthur park, Linda and I, and
one night while drinking we saw a man's body fall past our window.
it was an odd sight, something like a joke, but it wasn't any joke
when his body hit the pavement. "jesus christ," I told Linda, "he
plopped right apart like an old tomato! we are just made of guts and
shit and slimy stuff!come 'ere! come 'ere! look at 'im!" Linda came
to the window, then ran to the bathroom and vomited. she came
out. I turned and looked at her. "honest ta christ, baby, he's just
like
a big spilled bowl of rotten meat and spaghetti, dressed in a ripped
suit and shirt!" Linda ran back in and heaved again.
I sat and drank the wine. soon I heard the siren. what they
really needed was the Sanitation Dept. well, what the fuck, we all
had our troubles. I never knew where our rent was coming from and
we were too sick from drinking to look for work. everytime we
worried, all we could do about our worries was to fuck. that made us
forget for a while. we fucked a lot, and lucky for me, Linda was a
good lay.that whole hotel was full of people like us, drinking wine
and fucking and not knowing what next.now and then one of them
jumped out of the window.but the money always seemed to arrive
for us from somewhere, just when all seemed like we'd have to eat
our own shit, once $300 from a dead uncle, another time, a delayed,
income tax refund. another time I was riding on a bus and on the
seat in front of me where these 50 cent pieces. what it meant or who
had done it, I didn't know, still don't understand. I moved one seat
up and began stuffing the half bucks into my pockets. when the
pockets got full, I pulled the cord and got off at the next stop.
nobody said anything or tried to stop me. I mean, when you're
drunk, you've got to be lucky, even if you're not one, you've got to
be lucky.
part of each day we would spend in the park looking at the
ducks. you've got to believe me, that when your health is down
from continual drinking and lack of decent food, and you're tired of
fucking while trying to forget, you can't beat the ducks. I mean,
you've got to get out of your place, because you can get the deep
blue blues and it soon might be you out the window. it is easier to
do than you might imagine. so Linda and I would sit on a bench and
watch the ducks. the ducks didn't worry worth a damn - no rent, no
clothes, plenty of food - just float around shitting and quacking.
nobbling, nibbling, eating all the time. once in a while one of those
from the hotel would catch a duck at night, kill the thing, take it to
their room, clean it and cook it. we thought about it but never did
it. besides they were very hard to catch; you just get so close and
SLUUUSH!!! a spray of water and the motherfuckers would be gone!
most of the time we ate small pancakes made of flour and water, or
now and then we would steal some corn from somebody's garden -
one guy specialized in a corn garden - I don't believe he got to eat a
one of them, then there was always a bit of stealing from an outdoor
market - I mean there was a vegetable stand in front of a grocery -
store - this meant an occasional tomato or two or a small cucumber,
but we were petty thieves, small time, and we needed mostly luck.
the cigarettes were easiest - a walk at night - somebody always left
a car window down and a pack or half-pack of smokes on the dash-
board. of course, the wine and the rent were the real problems and
we fucked and worried about it.
and like all the days of final desperation, ours arrived. no more
wine, no more luck, no more anything. no more credit with the
landlady or the liquor store. I decided to set the alarm clock for
5:30 a. m. and walk down to the Farm Labor Market, but even the
clock didn't work right. it had broken and I had opened it to repair
it. it was a broken spring and the only way I could get the spring to
work again was to break a portion of it off, hook it up again, lock up
the works and wind it up. now if you want to know what a short
spring does to an alarm clock or I guess any kind of clock, I'll tell
you. the shorter the spring is, the faster the minute and hour hands
go around. it was some crazy clock, I'll tell you, and when we were
worn out with fucking to stop from worrying we used to watch that
clock and try to tell what time it really was. you could see that
minute hand moving - we used to laugh at it.
then one day - it took us a week to figure it - we found that
the clock moved thirty hours for each actual twelve hours of time
also it had to be wound every 7 or 8 hours or it would stop. some-
times we'd wake up and look at the clock and wonder what time it
was. "well, shit, baby," I'd say, "can't you figure out the thing? the
clock moves 2 and one half times as fast as it should. it's simple."
"yeah, but what time did it say when we last set the clock?"
she'd ask.
"damned if I know, baby, I was drunk."
"well, you better wind it or it'll stop."
"o.k."
I'd wind it, then we'd fuck.
so the morning I decided to go to the Farm Labor Market I
couldn't set the clock. we got hold of a bottle of wine from some-
where and drank it slowly. I watched that clock, not knowing what
it meant, and being afraid of missing the early morning, I just lay in
bed and didn't sleep all night. then I got up, dressed and walked
around waiting. there were quite a few tomatoes lying in the win-
dows and I picked up two or 3 of them and ate them. there was a
large blackboard: COTTENPICKERS NEEDED FOR BAKERS-
FIELD. FOOD AND LODGING. what the hell was that? cotton in
Bakersfield, Calif? I thought Eli Whitney and the cotton gin had put
all that out of the way. then a big truck drove up and it turned out
they needed tomato-pickers. well, shit, I hated to leave Linda in that
bed all alone like that. she could never stay in bed too long alone by
herself like that. but I decided to try it. everybody started climbing
into the truck. I waited and made sure that all the ladies were on
board, and there were some big ones. everybody was in, and then I
started to crawl up. a large Mexican, evidently the foreman, started
putting in the tailgates - "sorry, senor, full up!" they drove off
without me.
it was almost 9 p.m. by then and the walk back to the hotel
took an hour. I passed all the well-dressed stupid-looking people
and was almost run over once by an angry man in a black Caddy. I don't
know what he was angry about. maybe the weather. it was a hot
day. when I got back to the hotel I had to walk up the stairway
because the elevator was right by the landlady's door and she was
always fucking with the elevator, shining the brass, or just plain-ass
snooping.
it was 6 floors up and when I got there, I heard laughing from
my room. that bitch Linda hadn't waited too long to get started.
well, I'd whip her ass and his too. I opened the door.
it was Linda and Jeanie and Eve. "Sweetie!" said Linda, she
came up to me. she was all dressed in highheels. she gave me a lot of
tongue when she kissed. "Jeanie just got her first unemployment
check and Eve is on the dole! we're celebrating!"
there was plenty of port wine. I went in and took a bath and
then came out in my shorts. I always like to show off my legs. I had
the biggest most powerful legs I had ever seen on any man. the rest
of me wasn't too much. I sat in my torn shorts and put my legs up
on the coffee table.
"shit! look at those legs!" said Jeanie.
"yeah, yeah," said Eve.
Linda smiled. I was poured a wine.
you know how such things go. we drank and talked, talked
and drank. the girls went out for more bottles. more talk. the clock
went round and round. soon it was dark. I was drinking alone, still in
my torn shorts. Jeanie had gone to the bedroom and passed out in
the bed. Eve had passed out on the couch and Linda had passed out
on a smaller leather couch in the hall that led to the bathroom. I
still
couldn't understand that Mexican closing those tailgates on me. I
was unhappy.
I went into the bedroom and got into bed with Jeanie. she was
a large woman, and naked. I began kissing on her breasts, sucking at
them. "hey, what you doing?"
"doin? I'm going to fuck you!"
I put my finger into her cunt and moved it back and forth.
"I'm going to fuck you!"
"no! Linda would kill me!"
"she'll never know!"
I mounted and then very SLOWLY SLOWLY QUIETLY so
the springs wound not rattle, so there would not be a sound. I slid it
in and out in and out EVER SO SLOWLY and when I came I
thought I would never stop. it was one of the best fucks of my life.
as I wiped off on the sheets the thought occurred to me - it could
be that Man has been fucking improperly for centuries.
then I went, sat down in the dark, drank some more. I don't
remember how long I sat there. I drank quite a bit. then I went over
to Eve. Eve of the dole. she was a fat thing, a little wrinkled, but
had
very sexy lips, obscene sexy ugly lips. I began kissing that terrible
and beautiful mouth. she didn't protest at all. she opened her legs
and I entered. she was a little female pig, farting and grunting and
sniffling, wiggling, when I came it wasn't like with Jeanie - long and
trembling - it was just splot splot and then over. I got off. and
before I could get back to my chair I could hear her snoring again.
amazing - she fucked like she breathed - nothing to it. each woman
fucked just a bit differently, and that's what kept a man going, that's
what kept a man trapped.
I sat and drank some more thinking of what that dirty son of a
bitch in control of the tailgqate had done to me. it didn't pay to be
polite. then I began to think about the dole. could an unmarried
man and woman get on the dole? of course not. they were supposed
to starve to death. and love was a kind of dirty word. but that was
something of what it was between Linda and I - love. that's why we
starved together, drank together, lived together. what did marriage
mean? marriage meant a sanctified FUCK and a sanctified FUCK
that's what the world wanted: some poor son of a bitch, trapped and
unhappy, with a job to do. well, shit, I'd move down to skidrow and
move Linda in with Big Eddie. Big Eddie was an idiot but at least
he'd buy her some clothes and put some steaks in her belly which
was more than I was able to do.
Elephant Legs Bukowski, the social failure.
I finished off the bottle and decided I needed some sleep. I
wound up the alarm clock and crawled in with Linda. she awakened
and began rubbing up against me. "oh shit, oh shit," she said, "I
don't know what's the matter with me!"
"whatza matta, baby? you sick?you want me to call the Gen-
minor chance. Just get those twelve monkey's fucking. If you'd been
born a camel boy in Arabia you wouldn't even have this chance. So
get your back up and get those monkeys at it. You've been blessed
with a minor talent and you're not in India where probably two
dozen boys could write you under if they knew how to write. Well,
maybe not two dozen, maybe just a round dozen.
I finish the half-pint, drink half bottle of wine, go to bed,
forget it.
The next morning at nine a.m. the doorbell rings. There is a
young black girl standing there with a stupid-looking white guy in
rimless glasses. They tell me that I have made a promise to go boat-
ing with them at a party three nights ago. I get dressed, get into the
car with them. They drive to an apartment and a black-haired kid
met him at a party. He passes out little orange life-belts. Next I
know we're down at the pier. I can't tell the pier from the water.
They help me down a swinging wooden contraption that leads to a
floating dock. The bottom of the contraption and the dock are
about three feet apart. They help me down.
"What the fuck is this?" I ask. "Does anybody have a drink?"
I am with the wrong people. Nobody has a drink. Then I am in a
small rowboat, rented, and somebody has attached a half-horse-
power motor. The bottom of the boat is filled with water and two
dead fish. I don't know who the people are. They know me. Fine,
fine. We head out to sea. I vomit. We pass a suckerfish wrapped
around a flying monkey. No, that's terrible. I vomit again.
"How's the great writer?" asks the stupid-looking guy in the
prow of the boat, the guy with the rimless galsses.
"What a great writer?" asks the stupid-looking guy in the
prow of the boat, the guy with the rimless glasses.
"What great writer?" I ask, thinking he is talking about Rim-
baud, although I never thought Rimbaud a great writer.
"You," he says.
"Me?" I say, "Oh, fine. Think I'm going to Greece next year."
"Grease?" he says. "You mean up your ass?"
"No," I answer, "up yours."
We head out to sea where Conrad made it. To hell with Con-
rad. I'll take coke with bourbon in a dark bedroom in Hollywood in
1970, or whatever year you read this. The year of the monkey-orgy
that never happened. The motor flits and gnashes at the sea; we
plunge on toward Ireland. No, it's the Pacific. We plunge on toward
Japan. To hell with it.
===
10 jackoffs
old Sanchez is a genius but I am the only one who knows it
and it's always good to go see him. there are very few people I can
stay in a room with more than 5 minutes without feeling gutted.
Sanchez passes my tests, and I am very test, hehehehe, oh my god,
anyhow, I go to see him now and then in his hand-built two story
shack. he installed his own plumbing, has a free-feed line from a
high-power voltage line, has connected himself up a telephone which
feeds underground from a neighbor's installation, but he explains to
me that he cannot call long distance or out of the city without
exposing his sycophancy. he even lives with a young woman who
says very little, paints, walks about looking sexy and makes love to
him and him to her, of course. he bought the ground for very little
and although the place is some distance from Los Angeles, you
might call this an advantage. he sits among wires, popular mechanics
magazines, tape recording sets, shelves and shelves of books on all
subjects. he is concise, never rude; he is humorous and magic, he
writes very well but is not interested in fame, once in a great while
he will come out from his cave and read his poetry at some university,
and
it is said that the walls and the ivy tremble and shake for weeks
afterwards along with the co-eds, he has taped 10,000 tapes of con-
versation, sounds, music-dull and undull, usual and otherwise.
the walls are covered with photos, advertisements, drawings, hunks
of rock, snake skins, skulls, dried rubbers, soot, silver and spots of
golddust.
"I'm afraid I'm cracking," I tell him, "eleven years on the
same job, the hours dragging over me like wet shit, wow, and all the
faces melted down to zeros, yapping, laughing at nothing. I'm no
snob, Sanchez, but sometimes it gets to be a real horror show and
the only end is death or madness."
"sanity is an imperfection," he says, dropping a couple of pills
into his mouth. "jesus, I mean, I'm taught at several universities,
some prof is
writing a book on me- I've been translated into several lan-
guages-"
"we all have. you're getting old, Bukowski, you're weakening.
keep your moxie. Victory or Death."
"Adolph."
"Adolph."
"large gamble, large loss."
"right, or invert it for the common man."
"well, fuck."
"yeah."
"it gets quiet for a while, then he says, "you can come live with
us."
"thanks, sure, man. but I think I'll try a little more moxie
first."
"your game."
"Over his head is a black sign upon which he has pasted in white
type:
KIM."
-Dutch Schultz, on his deathbed.
WITH ME, GRAND OPERA IS THE BERRIES."
-Al Capone
"NE CRAIGNEZ POINT, MONSIEUR, LE TORTURE."
-Leibnetz.
"THERE IS NO MORE."
-Motto of Sitting Bull
"THE POLICEMAN'S CLIENT IS THE ELECTRIC CHAIR."
-George Jessel.
"FAST AND LOOSE IN ONE THING,
FAST AND LOOSE IN EVERYTHING.
I NEVER KNEW IT FAIR. NO MORE
WILL YOU, NOR NO ONE.
-Detective Bucket.
"AMEN IS THE INFLUENCE OF NUMBERS."
-Pico Della Mirandola,
in his kabbalistic conclusions
"SUCCESS AS THE RESULT OF INDUSTRY IS A PEAS-
ANT IDEAL."
-Wallace Stevens
"TO ME, MY SHIT STINKS BETTER EXCEPT THAN A
DOG'S."
-Charles Bukowski.
"NOW THE PORNOGRAPHERS WERE ASSEMBLED WITH
IN THE CREMATORIUM."
-Anthony Bloomfield.
"ADAGE OF SPONTANEITY - THE BACHELOR GRINDS
HIS CHOCOLATE HIMSELF."
-Marcel Duchamp.
"KISS THE HAND YOU CANNOT SEVER."
-Taureg saying.
"WE ALL, IN OUR DAY, WERE SMART FELLOWS."
-Admiral St. Vincent.
"MY DREAM IS TO SAVE THEM FROM NATURE."
-Christian Dior.
"OPEN SESAME - I WANT OUT."
-Stanislas Jerzy Lec.
"A YARDSTICK DOES NOT SAY THAT
THE OBJECT TO BE MEASURED
IS ONE YARD LONG."
-Ludwig Wittgenstein.
I am a bit gone on beer. "Say, I like that last one: "the object
to be murdered does not have to be a yard long."
"I think that's even better but it's not what is said."
"all right. how's Kaakaa? that's baby-language for shit, and a
more sexy woman I've never seen.
"I know. and it started with Kafka. she used to like Kafka and
I called her that. then she changed it herself." he gets up and walks
to a photo. "come 'ere, Bukowski." I flip my beercan into the
trashcan and walk on over. "what's this?" asks Sanchez.
I look at the photo. it is a very good photo.
"well, it looks like a cock."
"what kind of cock?"
" a stiff cock, a big one."
"it's mine."
"so?"
"don't you notice?"
"what?"
"the sperm."
"yes, I see it. I didn't want to say-"
"why not? what the hell's wrong with you?"
"I don't understand."
"I mean, do you see the sperm or don't you?"
"what do you mean?"
"I mean, I'm JACKING OFF, can't you understand how hard
that is to do?"
"it's not hard, Sanchez, I do it all the time-"
"oh, you ox! I mean I had the camera rigged-up with a string.
Do you realize what an enactment it was to remain quietly in focus,
ejaculate and trigger the camera at the same time?"
"I don't use a camera."
"how many men do? you miss the point, as usual. who the hell
you are translated into the German, the Spanish, the French and so
forth, I'll never know! look, do you realize that it took me THREE
DAYS to make this SIMPLE photograph? do you know how many
times I had to JACKOFF?"
"4 times?"
"TEN TIMES!"
"oh, Lord! how about Kaakaa?"
"she liked the photo."
"I mean-"
"good god, boy, I don't have the tongue to answer your sim-
plicity."
He goes on around back there and plops himself in his chair
again. among his wires and pliers and translations and his huge BIT-
TER-LEAP notebook, Adolph's nose glued to the black front with
edgeworks of the Berlin bunker in the background.
"I'm working on something now," I tell him, "short about me
walking in to interview the great composer. he's drunk. I get drunk,
there's a maid. we're on the wine. he leans forward and tells me,
'The Meek Shall Inherit the Earth,'-"
"yeah?"
"and then he says, 'translated that means that the stupid have
the greatest persistency.'"
"kind of lousy." he says, "but it's all right for you."
"but I don't know what to do with the story. I've got the
maid walking around in a very short thing and I don't know what to do
with it. I thought I might save the story by whiplashing the maid
with my belt buckle and then sucking the composer's dick. but I've
never sucked dick, never felt like it, I'm square, so I left the story
in
the center and never finished it."
"every man is a homo, a dick-sucker; every woman is a dyke,
why do you worry so much?"
"because if I'm happy I'm no good and I don't want to be
no good."
We sit there a while and then she comes from upstairs, the
flaxen straight string hair.
it's the first woman I could eat, I think.
but she walks past Sanchez and his tongue licks his lips just a bit,
she walks past me like separate ball-bearings of magic wavering crazy
flesh, may the heavens kiss my balls if it is not so, and she waves
through it all glorious as avalanche smashed by sun-
"hello, Hank," she says.
"Kaakaa," I laugh.
she goes behind her table and begins her bits of painting and
he sits there, Sanchez, beard blacker than black power, but calm
calm, no claims. I begin to get drunk, say nasty things, say anything.
then I begin to get dull. I mumble, I murmur. "Oh, sorry- ta spoil
yr evening-so sorry, fuckers- ya-I'm a killer but I won't
kill anybody. I got class. I'm Bukowski! translated into SEVEN
LANGUAGES! I AM the ONE! BUKOWSKI!"
I fall forward trying to look at the jackoff picture again, pitch
over something. it is one of my own shoes. I have this god damn bad
habit of taking off my own shoes.
"Hank," she says, "be careful."
"Bukowski?" he asks, "You all right?"
he lifts me up. "man, I think you better stay here tonight."
"NO GOD DAMN IT, I'M GOING TO THE WOOD-
CHOPPERS BALL!"
next thing I know he's got me over his shoulder, Sanchez has
and he's carrying me to his upstairs pad, you know, where he and
his woman do the thing, and then I'm down on the bed, he's gone.
door closed, and then I hear some kind of music downstairs, and
laughter, the both of them, but kind laughter, no malice, and I did
not know what to do, one did not expect the best, luck or people
everybody failed you finally, well, and then the door opened, a pop
of light, and there was Sanchez -
"hey, Bubu, a bottle of good French wine-sip it slowly, do
you most good. you'll sleep. be happy. I won't say we love you,
that's too easy. and if you want to come downstairs, dance and sing,
talk, o.k. do what you want. here's the wine."
he hands me the bottle. I lift it like some crazy cornet, again
and again. through a ripped curtain a part of the worn moon leaps. it
is a perfectly good night; it is not jail; it is far from that-
in the morning when I awaken, go down to piss, come out
from pissing, I find them both asleep on that narrow couch hardly
enough for one body, but they are not one body and their faces
together and asleep their bodies together and asleep, why be
corny??? I only feel the tiny clutch at the throat, the automatic
transmission blues of loveliness, that somebody has it, that they
don't even hate me-that they even wish me what?-
I walk out staunching and griefing and feeling and sick and
blue and bukowski, old, starlit sun, my god, reaching into the final
corner, the last midnight blast, cold Mr. C., big H, Mary Mary, clean
as a bug on the wall, the heat of December a brainweb across my
everlasting spine, Mercy like Kerouac's dead baby sprawled across
Mexican railroad tracks in the everlasting July of suck-off tombs, I
maybe writing this down by myself, leaving a few things out (I have
been threatened by various powerful forces for doing things that are
only normal and gaga gladful to do)
and I get into my eleven year old car
and now I have driven away
find myself here
and write you here a little illegal story of
love
beyond myself
but, perhaps, understandable to
you.
yours truly,
Sanchez and Bukowski
p.s. - this time the Heat missed. don't keep more than you
can swallow: love, heat or hate.
===
3chickens
Vicki was all right, but we had our troubles. we were on the
wine. port, that woman would get drunk and get to talking and she
would make up some of the vilest imaginable stuff about me. and
that tone of voice. shoddy and lisping and grating and insane. it
would get to any man. it got to me.
once she was screaming these insanities from the fold-down
bed in our apartment. I begged her to stop. but she wouldn't. finally,
I just walked over, lifted up the bed with her in it and folded
everything into the wall.
then I went over and sat down and listened to her scream.
but she kept screaming so I walked over and pulled the bed
out of the wall again there she lay, holding her arm, claiming it was
broken.
"your arm can't be broken," I said.
"it is, it is. oh, you slimy jackoff bastard, you've broken my
arm!"
I had some more drinks but she just kept holding her arm and
whining. I finally had enough and telling her I'd be right back I went
downstairs and outside and found some old wooden boxes behind a
grocery store. I found good sturdy slats, ripped them off, pulled out
the nails, got back on the elevator and rode back to our apartment.
it took about 4 slats. I bound them around her arm with
rippings from one of her dresses. she quieted down for a couple of
hours. then she started in again. I couldn't take it anymore. so I
called a taxi, we went to the General Hospital, as soon as the taxi
left
I took the boards off and threw them into the street. then they
x-rayed her CHEST and put her arm in a cast. can you imagine that?
I suppose if she broke her head they'd x-ray her ass.
anyhow, she used to sit in the bars after that and say, "I am
the only woman who has been folded into a wall in a wall bed."
and I wasn't so sure of THAT either, but I let her go on saying it.
now, another time she angered me and I slapped her but it was
across the mouth and it broke her false teeth.
I was surprised that it broke her false teeth. and I went out
and got this super cement glue and I glued her teeth together for her.
it worked for a while and then one night as she sat there drinking her
wine she suddenly had a mouthful of broken teeth.
that wine was so strong it undid the glue. it was disgusting. we
had to get her some new teeth. how we did it, I don't quite remem-
ber, but she claimed they made her look like a horse.
we'd usually always have these arguments after we drank
awhile, and Vicki claimed I'd get very mean when I was drunk but I
think that she was the one who was mean. anyhow, sometime during
the argument she'd get up, slam the door and run outside to some
bar. "looking for a live one," as the girls would say.
it always made me feel bad when she left. I've got to admit it.
sometimes she wouldn't come back for 2 or 3 days. and nights. it
wasn't a very nice thing to do.
one time she ran out and I sat there drinking the wine, think-
ing about it. then I got up and found the elevator and rode on down
to the streets too. I found her in her favorite bar. she sat there
holding a kind of purple scarf. I'd never seen the purple scarf before.
holding out on me. I walked up to her and said quite loudly:
"I've tried to make a woman out of you but you're nothing
but a god damned whore!"
the bar was full. every seat taken. I lifted my hand. I swung. I
backhanded her off that god damned stool. she fell to the floor and
screamed.
this was at the back end of the bar. I didn't even turn to look
at her. I walked the length of the bar to the exit. then I turned and
faced the crowd. it was very quiet.
"now," I said to them, "if there's anybody here who doesn't
LIKE what I just did, just SAY something-"
it was quieter than quiet.
I turned around and walked out the doorway. the moment I
hit the street I could hear them babbling and buzzing in there, buzzing
and babbling.
the SHITS! not a man in the boatload!
- but, of course, she came back, and, well, anyhow to get on,
this one night lately we are sitting around drinking the wine and the
same old arguments started. this time I decided to go.
I'M GONNA GET THE FUCK OUTA THIS HOLE!" I yelled
at Vicki. "I CAN'T STAND NO MORE OF YOUR GOD DAMNED
ABUSE!"
she jumped in front of the door.
"over my dead body, that's the only way you are getting out
of here!
"o.k., if that's the way it's gotta be."
I slammed her a good one and she fell down in front of the
doorway. I had to move her body to get out.
I took the elevator down. feeling rather good. a good jaunty
4-floor ride down. the elevator was kind of a cage-like contraption
and smelled like old stockings, old gloves, old dustmops, but it gave
me a feeling of security and power - somehow - and the wine rode
all through me.
but then I got outside and had a change of mind. I went to the
liquor store. bought 4 more bottles of wine and went back to my
place and rode the elevator back up. the same feeling of security and
power. I walked into my place. Vicki was sitting in a chair crying.
"I've come back to you, you lucky darling," I told her.
"you bastard, you hit me. YOU HIT ME!"
"umm, I said, opening a new bottle. "and you give me any
more shit and I'll hit you again."
"YEAH!" she screamed, "YOU'D HIT ME BUT YOU
WOULDN'T HAVE ENOUGH GUTS TO HIT A MAN!"
"HELL NO!" I screamed back, "I WOULDN'T HIT A MAN!
YOU THINK I'M CRAZY? WHAT'S THAT GOT TO DO WITH
IT?"
that settled her for a bit and we sat for a bit and we sat
drinking down the waterglassfuls of wine, port.
then she started in on her abusive stuff again, mostly claiming
I jacked off while she was asleep.
well, even if it were true I figured that was my business and if
it wasn't, then she was REALLY crazy. she claimed I jacked off in
the bathtub, in the closet, in the elevator, everywhere.
everytime I got out of the tub she'd run into the bathroom,
like:
"there! I SEE IT! LOOK AT IT!"
"you crazy bat, that's just the dirt-ring."
"no, that's "COME! that's COME!"
or she'd run in while I was bathing under the arms or between
the legs and say, "see, see, SEE! you're DOING IT!"
"doing WHAT? can't a man wash his BALLS? those are MY
balls, god damn you! can't a man wash his own balls?"
"what's that thing sticking up there?"
"my left index finger. now get the HELL OUT OF HERE!!!"
or in bed, I'd be sound asleep and all of a sudden this hand
grabbing my string and nuggets, man, sound asleep in the middle of
the night, these FINGERNAILS!
"AH HA! I CAUGHT YOU! I CAUGHT YOU!"
"you crazy bat, the next time you do that I SWEAR I AM
GOING TO KILL YOU!"
"for christ's sake, go to sleep-"
so this night she just sat there screaming her jackoff accusa-
tions. I just sat there and drank my wine and didn't deny anything.
this made her angry, angrier.
and angrier.
finally she couldn't stand it, all her talk about jackingoff, I
mean ME supposedly jackingoff and me just sitting there smiling at
her, and she jumped up and ran out the door.
I let her go. I sat there and drank my wine, port.
same old stuff.
I thought it over, umm, umm, well.
then very leisurely I got up and took the elevator down,same
old feeling of power. I was not angry. I was very calm. it was just the
same old war.
I walked on down the street but I didn't go to her favorite bar.
why repeat the same play? you are a whore; I tried to make a
woman out of you. balls. after a while a man could get to sounding
pretty silly. so I went to another bar and sat down on a stool near the
door. I ordered a drink and took a slug, set the timing down, and then
I saw her. Vicki. she was at the other end of the bar. for some reason
she looked scared shitless.
but I didn't go on down. I just stared at her as if I didn't know
her.
then I noticed something next to me in one of those old
fashioned fox furs. the dead fox's head hung down over her breast
looking at me. the breast looked at me.
"your fox looks like it needs a drink, sweetie" I told her.
"it's dead; it don't need a drink. I need a drink or I'm gonna
die."
well, a nice guy like me. who am I to spread death? I bought
her a drink, her name, she told me, was Margy. I told her that I was
Thomas Nightengale, shoesalesman. Margy. all these women with
names, drinking, crapping, having monthlies. fucking men. getting
folded into walls. it was too much.
we had a coupla more, and already she was in her purse, flash-
ing the photo of her children, an ugly demented boy and a girl
without any hair, they were in some dull place in Ohio, the father had
understanding. oh, one of THOSE? and he brought these women in
the house and screwed them in front of her with all the lights on.
"ah, I see, I see," I said. "yes, of course, most men are beasts,
they simply do not understand. and you're SUCH a sweetie, what
the hell, it ain't right."
I suggested we go to another bar. Vicki's ass was twitching and
she was half Indian.
we left her there. we went around the corner. we had one
around the corner.
then I suggested we go to my place. do a little eating. I mean,
get something to cook, bake, fry.
I didn't tell her about Vicki, of course. but Vicki always
prided herself on her god damned baked chickens. maybe it was
because she looked like one. a baked chicken with horse teeth.
so I suggested we get a chicken, bake it, bathe it in whiskey.
she did not demur.
so. liquor store. 5th of whiskey. 5 or 6 quarts of beer.
we found an all night market. the place even had a butcher.
"we wanta bake a chicken," I said.
"oh, christ," he said.
I dropped one of the quarts of beer. it really exploded.
"christ," he said.
I dropped another to see what he would say.
"oh, jesus," he said.
"I want THREE CHICKENS," I said.
"THREE CHICKENS?" "jesus christ, yes," I said.
the butcher reached in and got three very white-yellow chick-
ens with a few long black unplucked hairs that looked like human
hairs on them and he wrapped them all up a big big bundle, all in
pink tough paper with this real gripping tape, and I paid him and we
got out of there.
I dropped 2 more quarts of beer on the way.
I rode up the elevator, feeling my power rising. when we got
inside my door I lifted Margy's dress to see what was holding her
stockings up. then I gave her a big chummy whiskey-goose with
long-finger right hand. she screamed and dropped the big pink bun-
dle. it fell on the rug and the 3 chickens came out. those 3 chickens,
all white-yellow with their 29 or 30 drooling dropping murdered
human hairs sticking to them looked very strange gaping there on
that worn rug of yellow and brown flowers and trees and Chinese
dragons, under electric lights in los angeles at the end of the world
near 6th street under Union.
"oooh, the chickens."
"fuck the chickens."
her garter belt was dirty. it was perfect. I goosed her again.
well, shit, so I sat down and peeled the whiskey bottle, poured
a couple of tall waterglasses full, took off my shoes stockings pants
shirt, took one of her cigarettes. sat in my underwear. I always do
that, right away. I like to be comfortable.. if the broad don't like
it,
fuck her. she can go. but they always stay. I got a manner. some
broads say I should have been a king. others say other things. fuck
'em.
she drank most of her drink and started for her purse. "I have
some children in Ohio. they're lovely children-"
"forget that. we've been through that stage. tell me, do you
suck dick?"
"what do you mean?"
"OH, BALLS!" I smashed my glass against the wall.
then I got another one, filled it up, and we drank some more.
I don't know how long we worked on the whiskey but it must
have gotten to me because the next thing I know I was laying on the
bed naked. staring up at the electric light and Margy was standing
there naked and she was rubbing my penis quite rapidly with her fox
fur. and while she was rubbing she was saying over and over, "I am
going to fuck you, I am going to fuck you-"
"listen," I said. "I don't know if you can fuck me. I jacked-off
in the elevator earlier this evening. I think it was about 8 o'clock."
"I will fuck you anyhow."
she really speeded up that fox fur. it was all right. maybe I
could get one for myself. I once knew a guy who put raw liver in a
long drinking glass and screwed that. me, I didn't like to stick my
thing into anything that could break or slice. imagine going to a
doctor with a bloody cock and saying it happened while screwing a
water glass. once while I was bumming in a small town in Texas I
saw this well-built wonderful fuck of a young broad married to this
little shriveled up old dwarf with a nasty disposition and some kind of
malady that made him trembly all over. she supported him and
pushed him around in a wheelchair, and I used to think of him
pouncing on all that good meat. I'd get a picture of it, you know,
and then finally I got the story. when she had been a younger girl
she had gotten this coke bottle stuck all the way into her snatch and
just couldn't get the thing out and had to go to a doctor. he got it
out, and somehow the story got out. she was ruined in that town
after that, and didn't have sense enough to get out. nobody wanted
her except the nasty dwarf with the shakes. he didn't give a damn -
he had the best piece of ass in town.
where was I? oh, yeah.
her fox fur went faster and faster and I finally got something
going just as I heard a key go into the door. oh, shit, it was probably
Vicki!
well, it's simple, I thought. I'll just boot her ass out and go
about my business.
the door opened and there stood Vicki with 2 cops standing
behind her.
"GET THAT WOMAN OUT OF MY HOUSE!" she screamed.
COPS! I couldn't believe it. I pulled the sheet over my pulsa-
ting and throbbing and giant sexual organ and pretended to be
asleep. it looked like I had a cucumber under there.
Margy was screaming back: "I know you, Vicki, this ain't your
god damned house! this guy EARNS his way by licking your asshole
hairs! he gets you babbling to heaven in Morse code with that long
sandpaper tongue of his, you're nothing but a WHORE, a true
blue turdy-gulping 2-dollar whore. and THAT went out with Franky
D., and you were 48 THEN!"
hearing that, my cucumber went down. both of these broads
must have been 80 years old. singly, that is, together they might
have reached back to suck-off Abe Lincoln, something like that.
suck-off General Robert E. Lee, Patrick Henry. Mozart. Dr. Samuel
Johnson. Robespierre. Napoleon. Machiavelli? wine preserves. God
endures. the whores blow on.
and Vicki screamed back: "WHO'S A WHORE? WHO'S A
WHORE, HUH? YOU'RE A WHORE, THAT'S WHO! YOU'VE
BEEN SELLING THAT CLAPPED HOLE OF YOURS UP AND
DOWN ALVARADO STREET FOR 30 YEARS! A BLIND RAT
WOULD BACK UP 4 TIMES IF HE RAN INTO THERE ONCE!
AND YOU HOLLERING 'POW! POW!' WHEN YOU'RE LUCKY
ENOUGH TO GET A GUY TO COME! AND THAT WENT OUT
WHEN CONFUCIUS FUCKED HIS MOTHER!"
"WHY YOU CHEAP BITCH. YOU'VE GIVEN OUT MORE
BLUE BALLS THAN A SILVER CHRISTMAS TREE IN DISNEY-
LAND. WHY YOU-"
"listen, ladies," said one of the cops. "I will have to ask you to
watch your remarks and lower the volume. understanding and kind-
ness are the keynotes of Democratic thought. oh, I just DO love the
way Bobby Kennedy wears that tickling blobbing knot of raunchy
hair over one side of his darling head don't you just?"
"why you fuckin' queer," said Margy, "is that why you wear
them tight pants, to make your asshole sweeter? god, it DOES look
NICE! I'd kinda like to do you in myself. I see you shits bending
over into car windows giving out tickets on the freeways and I
always feel like pinching your tight little asses."
the cop suddenly got a brilliant flare in his dead eyes, he
unhitched his club and tapped Margy along the side of the neck with
it. she fell to the floor.
then he slipped the bracelets on her. I could hear those clicks,
and the bastards ALWAYS snapped them too tight. but they felt
almost GOOD once you got them on. kind of forceful and heavy and
you felt like Christ or something dramatic.
I kept my eyes closed so I couldn't see whether they threw a
robe or something over her.
then the cop who snapped the bracelets said to the other cop,
"I'll take her on the elevator. we'll go on the elevator."
and I couldn't hear very well, but I listened as they went
down, and I heard Margy screaming, "oooooh, oooooooh, you bas-
tard. let go of me, let go of me!"
and he kept saying, "shut up, shut up, shut up! you're only
getting what you deserve! and you haven't seen ANYTHING yet!
this-is just the-beginning!"
then she really screamed.
then the other cop walked over to me. through one narrowed
eye I could see him put his big black shiny shoe up on the mattress,
up on the sheet.
he looked down at me.
"is this guy a fag? he looks like a fag, sure as hell."
"I don't' THINK he is. he might be. he can sure ball a broad,
though."
"you want me to run him in?" he asked Vicki.
I had my eyes closed. it was a long wait. god, it was a long
wait. that big foot there on my sheets. the electric light shining
down.
then she spoke. finally. "no, he's-.o.k. leave him there."
the cop took his foot down. I heard him walk across the room,
then wait at the door. he spoke to Vicki:
"I'm going to have to charge you 5 bucks more for your
protection next month. you're getting a bit harder to watch out
for."
then he was gone. I mean, out into the hall. I waited for him
to get into the elevator. I heard it go down to the first floor. I
counted to 64. then, I LEAPED OUT OF BED.
my nostrils were flaring like Gregory Peck in heat.
"YOU ROTTEN BITCH. YOU EVER DO THAT AGAIN
AND I'M GOING TO KILL YOU!"
"NO, NO, NO!!!"
I raised my hand to give her the old backhand.
"I TOLD HIM NOT TO TAKE YOU!" she screamed at me.
"ummm. that's right. I've got to consider that."
I lowered my hand.
then there was some whiskey left and some wine too. I got up
and put the chain on the door.
we turned off the lights and sat there and drank and smoked
and talked about things. this, and that, easy and casual, then, like
old times, we looked at the same red horse that flew and flew in red
neon on the side of a building just downtown to our east. it flew and
flew on the side of this building all night. no matter what happened.
you know what it was, a kind of red horse with red wings of neon.
but I told you that. a winged horse. anyhow, like always, we count-
ed: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. the wings always flapped 7
times. then the horse, everything, stood still, then, it started again.
our whole apartment would be in this red glow. then when the horse
stopped flying, somehow things would get white for a flash. I don't
know why. I think that it was caused by an advertisement beneath
the red winged horse. it said, some kind of product, buy this or buy
that, in this WHITE. anyhow.
we sat and talked and drank and smoked.
later we went to bed together. she kissed very nicely, her
tongue was kind of an apologetic sadness.
then we fucked. we fucked as the red horse flew.
7 times the wings flapped.. and in the center of the rug the 3
chickens were still there. watching. the chickens turned red, the
chickens turned white. 14 times they turned red. then they
turned white. 21 times they turned red. then they turned white. 28
times-
it had ended a better night than most.
===
3women
we lived right across from McArthur park, Linda and I, and
one night while drinking we saw a man's body fall past our window.
it was an odd sight, something like a joke, but it wasn't any joke
when his body hit the pavement. "jesus christ," I told Linda, "he
plopped right apart like an old tomato! we are just made of guts and
shit and slimy stuff!come 'ere! come 'ere! look at 'im!" Linda came
to the window, then ran to the bathroom and vomited. she came
out. I turned and looked at her. "honest ta christ, baby, he's just
like
a big spilled bowl of rotten meat and spaghetti, dressed in a ripped
suit and shirt!" Linda ran back in and heaved again.
I sat and drank the wine. soon I heard the siren. what they
really needed was the Sanitation Dept. well, what the fuck, we all
had our troubles. I never knew where our rent was coming from and
we were too sick from drinking to look for work. everytime we
worried, all we could do about our worries was to fuck. that made us
forget for a while. we fucked a lot, and lucky for me, Linda was a
good lay.that whole hotel was full of people like us, drinking wine
and fucking and not knowing what next.now and then one of them
jumped out of the window.but the money always seemed to arrive
for us from somewhere, just when all seemed like we'd have to eat
our own shit, once $300 from a dead uncle, another time, a delayed,
income tax refund. another time I was riding on a bus and on the
seat in front of me where these 50 cent pieces. what it meant or who
had done it, I didn't know, still don't understand. I moved one seat
up and began stuffing the half bucks into my pockets. when the
pockets got full, I pulled the cord and got off at the next stop.
nobody said anything or tried to stop me. I mean, when you're
drunk, you've got to be lucky, even if you're not one, you've got to
be lucky.
part of each day we would spend in the park looking at the
ducks. you've got to believe me, that when your health is down
from continual drinking and lack of decent food, and you're tired of
fucking while trying to forget, you can't beat the ducks. I mean,
you've got to get out of your place, because you can get the deep
blue blues and it soon might be you out the window. it is easier to
do than you might imagine. so Linda and I would sit on a bench and
watch the ducks. the ducks didn't worry worth a damn - no rent, no
clothes, plenty of food - just float around shitting and quacking.
nobbling, nibbling, eating all the time. once in a while one of those
from the hotel would catch a duck at night, kill the thing, take it to
their room, clean it and cook it. we thought about it but never did
it. besides they were very hard to catch; you just get so close and
SLUUUSH!!! a spray of water and the motherfuckers would be gone!
most of the time we ate small pancakes made of flour and water, or
now and then we would steal some corn from somebody's garden -
one guy specialized in a corn garden - I don't believe he got to eat a
one of them, then there was always a bit of stealing from an outdoor
market - I mean there was a vegetable stand in front of a grocery -
store - this meant an occasional tomato or two or a small cucumber,
but we were petty thieves, small time, and we needed mostly luck.
the cigarettes were easiest - a walk at night - somebody always left
a car window down and a pack or half-pack of smokes on the dash-
board. of course, the wine and the rent were the real problems and
we fucked and worried about it.
and like all the days of final desperation, ours arrived. no more
wine, no more luck, no more anything. no more credit with the
landlady or the liquor store. I decided to set the alarm clock for
5:30 a. m. and walk down to the Farm Labor Market, but even the
clock didn't work right. it had broken and I had opened it to repair
it. it was a broken spring and the only way I could get the spring to
work again was to break a portion of it off, hook it up again, lock up
the works and wind it up. now if you want to know what a short
spring does to an alarm clock or I guess any kind of clock, I'll tell
you. the shorter the spring is, the faster the minute and hour hands
go around. it was some crazy clock, I'll tell you, and when we were
worn out with fucking to stop from worrying we used to watch that
clock and try to tell what time it really was. you could see that
minute hand moving - we used to laugh at it.
then one day - it took us a week to figure it - we found that
the clock moved thirty hours for each actual twelve hours of time
also it had to be wound every 7 or 8 hours or it would stop. some-
times we'd wake up and look at the clock and wonder what time it
was. "well, shit, baby," I'd say, "can't you figure out the thing? the
clock moves 2 and one half times as fast as it should. it's simple."
"yeah, but what time did it say when we last set the clock?"
she'd ask.
"damned if I know, baby, I was drunk."
"well, you better wind it or it'll stop."
"o.k."
I'd wind it, then we'd fuck.
so the morning I decided to go to the Farm Labor Market I
couldn't set the clock. we got hold of a bottle of wine from some-
where and drank it slowly. I watched that clock, not knowing what
it meant, and being afraid of missing the early morning, I just lay in
bed and didn't sleep all night. then I got up, dressed and walked
around waiting. there were quite a few tomatoes lying in the win-
dows and I picked up two or 3 of them and ate them. there was a
large blackboard: COTTENPICKERS NEEDED FOR BAKERS-
FIELD. FOOD AND LODGING. what the hell was that? cotton in
Bakersfield, Calif? I thought Eli Whitney and the cotton gin had put
all that out of the way. then a big truck drove up and it turned out
they needed tomato-pickers. well, shit, I hated to leave Linda in that
bed all alone like that. she could never stay in bed too long alone by
herself like that. but I decided to try it. everybody started climbing
into the truck. I waited and made sure that all the ladies were on
board, and there were some big ones. everybody was in, and then I
started to crawl up. a large Mexican, evidently the foreman, started
putting in the tailgates - "sorry, senor, full up!" they drove off
without me.
it was almost 9 p.m. by then and the walk back to the hotel
took an hour. I passed all the well-dressed stupid-looking people
and was almost run over once by an angry man in a black Caddy. I don't
know what he was angry about. maybe the weather. it was a hot
day. when I got back to the hotel I had to walk up the stairway
because the elevator was right by the landlady's door and she was
always fucking with the elevator, shining the brass, or just plain-ass
snooping.
it was 6 floors up and when I got there, I heard laughing from
my room. that bitch Linda hadn't waited too long to get started.
well, I'd whip her ass and his too. I opened the door.
it was Linda and Jeanie and Eve. "Sweetie!" said Linda, she
came up to me. she was all dressed in highheels. she gave me a lot of
tongue when she kissed. "Jeanie just got her first unemployment
check and Eve is on the dole! we're celebrating!"
there was plenty of port wine. I went in and took a bath and
then came out in my shorts. I always like to show off my legs. I had
the biggest most powerful legs I had ever seen on any man. the rest
of me wasn't too much. I sat in my torn shorts and put my legs up
on the coffee table.
"shit! look at those legs!" said Jeanie.
"yeah, yeah," said Eve.
Linda smiled. I was poured a wine.
you know how such things go. we drank and talked, talked
and drank. the girls went out for more bottles. more talk. the clock
went round and round. soon it was dark. I was drinking alone, still in
my torn shorts. Jeanie had gone to the bedroom and passed out in
the bed. Eve had passed out on the couch and Linda had passed out
on a smaller leather couch in the hall that led to the bathroom. I
still
couldn't understand that Mexican closing those tailgates on me. I
was unhappy.
I went into the bedroom and got into bed with Jeanie. she was
a large woman, and naked. I began kissing on her breasts, sucking at
them. "hey, what you doing?"
"doin? I'm going to fuck you!"
I put my finger into her cunt and moved it back and forth.
"I'm going to fuck you!"
"no! Linda would kill me!"
"she'll never know!"
I mounted and then very SLOWLY SLOWLY QUIETLY so
the springs wound not rattle, so there would not be a sound. I slid it
in and out in and out EVER SO SLOWLY and when I came I
thought I would never stop. it was one of the best fucks of my life.
as I wiped off on the sheets the thought occurred to me - it could
be that Man has been fucking improperly for centuries.
then I went, sat down in the dark, drank some more. I don't
remember how long I sat there. I drank quite a bit. then I went over
to Eve. Eve of the dole. she was a fat thing, a little wrinkled, but
had
very sexy lips, obscene sexy ugly lips. I began kissing that terrible
and beautiful mouth. she didn't protest at all. she opened her legs
and I entered. she was a little female pig, farting and grunting and
sniffling, wiggling, when I came it wasn't like with Jeanie - long and
trembling - it was just splot splot and then over. I got off. and
before I could get back to my chair I could hear her snoring again.
amazing - she fucked like she breathed - nothing to it. each woman
fucked just a bit differently, and that's what kept a man going, that's
what kept a man trapped.
I sat and drank some more thinking of what that dirty son of a
bitch in control of the tailgqate had done to me. it didn't pay to be
polite. then I began to think about the dole. could an unmarried
man and woman get on the dole? of course not. they were supposed
to starve to death. and love was a kind of dirty word. but that was
something of what it was between Linda and I - love. that's why we
starved together, drank together, lived together. what did marriage
mean? marriage meant a sanctified FUCK and a sanctified FUCK
that's what the world wanted: some poor son of a bitch, trapped and
unhappy, with a job to do. well, shit, I'd move down to skidrow and
move Linda in with Big Eddie. Big Eddie was an idiot but at least
he'd buy her some clothes and put some steaks in her belly which
was more than I was able to do.
Elephant Legs Bukowski, the social failure.
I finished off the bottle and decided I needed some sleep. I
wound up the alarm clock and crawled in with Linda. she awakened
and began rubbing up against me. "oh shit, oh shit," she said, "I
don't know what's the matter with me!"
"whatza matta, baby? you sick?you want me to call the Gen-