Charles Bukowski Poems

he drank wine all night of the
28th, and he kept thinking of her:
the way she walked and talked and loved
the way she told him things that seemed true
...

he lives in a house with a swimming pool
and says the job is
killing him.
he is 27. I am 44. I can’t seem to
...

naked along the side of the house,
8 a.m., spreading sesame seed oil
over my body, Jesus, have I come
to this?
...

during my worst times
on the park benches
in the jails
or living with
...

It's never quite right, he said, the way people look,
the way the music sounds, the way the words are
written.
It's never quite right, he said, all the things we are
...

call it the greenhouse effect or whatever
but it just doesn't rain like it used to.
I particularly remember the rains of the
depression era.
...

she's young, she said,
but look at me,
I have pretty ankles,
and look at my wrists, I have pretty
...

not much chance,
completely cut loose from
purpose,
he was a young man
...

They don't make it
the beautiful die in flame-
suicide pills, rat poison, rope what-
ever...
...

you haven't lived
until you've been in a
flophouse
with nothing but one
...