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 Jun 2014 Rlavr
Charles Bukowski
some people never go crazy.
me, sometimes I'll lie down behind the couch
for 3 or 4 days.
they'll find me there.
it's Cherub, they'll say, and
they pour wine down my throat
rub my chest
sprinkle me with oils.
then, I'll rise with a roar,
rant, rage -
curse them and the universe
as I send them scattering over the
lawn.
I'll feel much better,
sit down to toast and eggs,
hum a little tune,
suddenly become as lovable as a
pink
overfed whale.
some people never go crazy.
what truly horrible lives
they must lead.
 Jun 2014 Rlavr
Charles Bukowski
against the wall, the firing squad ready.
then he got a reprieve.
suppose they had shot Dostoevsky?
before he wrote all that?
I suppose it wouldn't have
mattered
not directly.
there are billions of people who have
never read him and never
will.
but as a young man I know that he
got me through the factories,
past the ******,
lifted me high through the night
and put me down
in a better
place.
even while in the bar
drinking with the other
derelicts,
I was glad they gave Dostoevsky a
reprieve,
it gave me one,
allowed me to look directly at those
rancid faces
in my world,
death pointing its finger,
I held fast,
an immaculate drunk
sharing the stinking dark with
my
brothers.
 Jun 2014 Rlavr
Charles Bukowski
washed-up, on shore, the old yellow notebook
  out again
  I write from the bed
  as I did last
  year.
  will see the doctor,
  Monday.
  "yes, doctor, weak legs, vertigo, head-
  aches and my back
  hurts."
  "are you drinking?" he will ask.
  "are you getting your
exercise, your
  vitamins?"
  I think that I am just ill
  with life, the same stale yet
  fluctuating
  factors.
  even at the track
  I watch the horses run by
  and it seems
  meaningless.
  I leave early after buying tickets on the
  remaining races.
  "taking off?" asks the motel
  clerk.
  "yes, it's boring,"
  I tell him.
  "If you think it's boring
  out there," he tells me, "you oughta be
  back here."
  so here I am
  propped up against my pillows
  again
  just an old guy
  just an old writer
  with a yellow
  notebook.
  something is
  walking across the
  floor
  toward
  me.
  oh, it's just
  my cat
  this
  time.
 Jun 2014 Rlavr
Charles Bukowski
during my worst times
on the park benches
in the jails
or living with
******
I always had this certain
contentment-
I wouldn't call it
happiness-
it was more of an inner
balance
that settled for
whatever was occuring
and it helped in the
factories
and when relationships
went wrong
with the
girls.
it helped
through the
wars and the
hangovers
the backalley fights
the
hospitals.
to awaken in a cheap room
in a strange city and
pull up the shade-
this was the craziest kind of
contentment

and to walk across the floor
to an old dresser with a
cracked mirror-
see myself, ugly,
grinning at it all.
what matters most is
how well you
walk through the
fire.
 Jun 2014 Rlavr
Charles Bukowski
the women of the past keep
phoning.
there was another yesterday
arrived from out of
state.
she wanted to see
me.
I told her
"no."

I don't want to see
them,
I won't see them.
it would be
awkward
gruesome and
useless.

I know some people who can
watch the same movie
more than
once.

not me.
once I know the
plot
once I know the
ending
whether it's happy or
unhappy or
just plain
dumb,
then

for me
that movie is
finished
forever
and that's why
I refuse
to let
any of my
old movies play
over and over again
for
years.
 Mar 2014 Rlavr
Ivy Rose
Or
 Mar 2014 Rlavr
Ivy Rose
Or
I do not like this phase of a heart break.

When you purposely avoid love songs,
Or sometimes you play them just to make yourself feel like your hearts still pounding.

When the person you loved and hid from every waking soul is brought into a conversation.
Or when he isn't.

When you see other lovers who have made it years without the cruel hand of fate ripping their love from them.
Or when you see they haven't.

When you notice him writing you smaller, casual messages when they use to be breathtaking and beautiful.
Or when he doesn't write at all.

When I ask you if I am pushing you away and you say no.

"Alright, happy birthday! Text me later tonight?"

"Will do"


When every hidden goodbye ends with those two words. And my broken, belittled heart.

(i. r.)
Please don't do this.
I. Can't. Lose. You.
 Jan 2014 Rlavr
Mauri Pollard
Once, you told me to write a poem about your love.
The crashing and demolishing and devouring
blue lips.
I tried, I promise.
But how do I bury what I did underneath water?
It floats to the top. Always.

Once, you told me to let my soul speak,
but it kept its ignorant mouth shut.
Now it's wailing and pining and crying
out for you,
but it stayed quiet much too long.

Once, you told me if I drifted away,
you would stay with me, laying on the grass,
the moon glowing and gleaming and smiling.
But you left me on the cold
September grass,
although the bitter air feels more like
November or
February.

Once, I was scared of falling asleep-
of Darth Maul and Aardvarks and little boys.
So you ran past trip wires and over laser beams to be with me-
my dream catcher-
but the back door.
You forgot the back door.
A few months later it happened again,
but this time your parents didn't call.
They think you're on a life preserver
this time.
Little do they know how blind they are.
That life saver is headed straight
to jagged rocks.
I a watching.
Still. Always.
A tiny drop in the dashing blue and
foaming white.
A tear drop.

Once, I told you my heart is an ocean of secrets,
and a few months later you found out exactly how.
And you cried thus filling our ocean with more salty drops.
Later, I filled it with my own.
And somewhere, somewhere in that vast ocean, spread out over miles and miles, both our teardrops are running around.

Once, you told me to write about salt water.
The waves and the tide and
capsizing boats.
So, now, when I think of the ocean,
deep blue, caverns, untold mysteries,
I think of you.
Well, after one and a half years, I finally wrote it.
Too bad you're a million miles away.
 Oct 2013 Rlavr
Lord Byron
She walks in beauty, like the night
     Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that’s best of dark and bright
     Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellowed to that tender light
     Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,
     Had half impaired the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
     Or softly lightens o’er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
     How pure, how dear their dwelling place.

And on that cheek, and o’er that brow,
     So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
     But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
     A heart whose love is innocent!
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