Bukowski - Anyone?

nova · Tue Mar 02, 2010 7:06 pm

Bukowski is one of the poets that I can read in large chunks. He wrote a lot of throwaways but for every three like that he would write one that encapsulated a moment perfectly.

From wiki:

Henry Charles Bukowski (August 16, 1920 – March 9, 1994) was an American poet, novelist, and short story writer. Bukowski's writing was heavily influenced by the geography and atmosphere of his home city of Los Angeles, and is marked by an emphasis on the ordinary lives of poor Americans, the act of writing, alcohol, relationships with women, and the drudgery of work. A prolific author, Bukowski wrote thousands of poems, hundreds of short stories, and six novels, eventually having over 60 books in print. In 1986 Time called Bukowski a "laureate of American lowlife."

Flophouse
you haven't lived
until you've been in a
flophouse
with nothing but one
light bulb
and 56 men
squeezed together
on cots
with everybody
snoring
at once
and some of those
snores
so
deep and
gross and
unbelievable-
dark
snotty
gross
subhuman
wheezings
from hell
itself.
your mind
almost breaks
under those
death-like
sounds
and the
intermingling
odors:
hard
unwashed socks
pissed and
shitted
underwear
and over it all
slowly circulating
air
much like that
emanating from
uncovered
garbage
cans.
and those
bodies
in the dark
fat and
thin
and
bent
some
legless
armless
some
mindless
and worst of
all:
the total
absence of
hope
it shrouds
them
covers them
totally.
it's not
bearable.
you get
up
go out
walk the
streets
up and
down
sidewalks
past buildings
around the
corner
and back
up
the samestreet
thinking
those men
were all
children
once
what has happened
to
them?
and what has
happened
to
me?
it's dark
and cold
out
here.

bleachededen · Wed Mar 03, 2010 12:00 am

I like Bukowski a lot, especially for his style and cynicism. I'm a huge fan of erratic line breaks and short lines that form a longer thought that is more beautiful when seen in the tiny chunks of text he presents. I find his work most enjoyable when reading it aloud. All poetry benefits from being read aloud, and I don't mean listening to someone else read it (which is also nice), but reading aloud to yourself. It adds a whole extra dimension to the work which can be astonishing.

nova · Wed Mar 03, 2010 11:37 am


	bleachededen wrote: I like Bukowski a lot, especially for his style and cynicism. I'm a huge fan of erratic line breaks and short lines that form a longer thought that is more beautiful when seen in the tiny chunks of text he presents. I find his work most enjoyable when reading it aloud. All poetry benefits from being read aloud, and I don't mean listening to someone else read it (which is also nice), but reading aloud to yourself. It adds a whole extra dimension to the work which can be astonishing.

Hi,

I have read a fair amount of his work. He was as productive as Jimi Hendrix once he was in his grave. His estate should be running out work to print by now.

His style is not pretty. It is small poetry. By small I mean it is of little events and moments. It is not stirring, nor does it embrace the cosmos. It is just life as seen by an alkie. While he had his 15 minutes awhile ago, I think the world he writes of not only never left, but is making a comeback.

bleachededen · Thu Mar 04, 2010 12:48 am


	nova wrote: His style is not pretty. It is small poetry. By small I mean it is of little events and moments. It is not stirring, nor does it embrace the cosmos. It is just life as seen by an alkie. While he had his 15 minutes awhile ago, I think the world he writes of not only never left, but is making a comeback.

Pretty is an objective term, and I didn't say pretty, I said beautiful, because those small moments he captures are beautiful, but we usually don't stop to write them down. His crudeness becomes something more because he gave it life, and that is the way I write, as well (although my influences include more flourid prose, as well, so my style may actually seem more "pretty" than his).

I prefer poetry that captures only a moment to that which tries to encapsulate the cosmos or sentiments far larger than themselves. If I do write like that myself, I find the larger world by accident, and I like that sentiment in other poets, as well. One moment can encapsulate the cosmos, even accidentally, and that is far more exciting to me than trying to ponder the cosmos outright. It seems too stilted and intentional, and I think there is beauty in the accidental, in the mundane, in the crude.

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