Classic Poetry Series Charles Bukowski - poems - Publication Date: 2004 Publisher: PoemHunter.Com - The World's Poetry Archive 16-bit Intel 8088 chip with an Apple Macintosh you can't run Radio Shack programs in its disc drive. nor can a Commodore 64 drive read a file you have created on an IBM Personal Computer. both Kaypro and Osborne computers use the CP/M operating system but can't read each other's handwriting for they format (write on) discs in different ways. the Tandy 2000 runs MS-DOS but can't use most programs produced for the IBM Personal Computer unless certain bits and bytes are altered but the wind still blows over Savannah and in the Spring the turkey buzzard struts and flounces before his hens. Charles Bukowski www.PoemHunter.com - The World's Poetry Archive 2 40,000 at the track today, Father's Day, each paid admission was entitled to a wallet and each contained a little surprise. Charles Bukowski www.PoemHunter.com - The World's Poetry Archive 3 8 Count from my bed I watch 3 birds on a telephone wire. one flies off. then another. one is left, then it too is gone. my typewriter is tombstone still. and I am reduced to bird watching. just thought I'd let you know, fucker. Charles Bukowski www.PoemHunter.com - The World's Poetry Archive 4 A Challenge To The Dark shot in the eye shot in the brain shot in the ass shot like a flower in the dance Charles Bukowski www.PoemHunter.com - The World's Poetry Archive 5 A Following the phone rang at 1:30 a.m. and it was a man from Denver: Charles Bukowski www.PoemHunter.com - The World's Poetry Archive 6 A Man Charles Bukowski www.PoemHunter.com - The World's Poetry Archive 7 A Radio With Guts it was on the 2nd floor on Coronado Street I used to get drunk and throw the radio through the window while it was playing, and, of course, it would break the glass in the window and the radio would sit there on the roof still playing and I'd tell my woman, "Ah, what a marvelous radio!" the next morning I'd take the window off the hinges and carry it down the street to the glass man who would put in another pane. I kept throwing that radio through the window each time I got drunk and it would sit there on the roof still playing- a magic radio a radio with guts, and each morning I'd take the window back to the glass man. I don't remember how it ended exactly though I do remember we finally moved out. there was a woman downstairs who worked in the garden in her bathing suit, she really dug with that trowel and she put her behind up in the air and I used to sit in the window and watch the sun shine all over that thing while the music played. Charles Bukowski www.PoemHunter.com - The World's Poetry Archive 8 a smile to remember we had goldfish and they circled around and around in the bowl on the table near the heavy drapes covering the picture window and my mother, always smiling, wanting us all to be happy, told me, "be happy Henry!" and she was right: it's better to be happy if you can but my father continued to beat her and me several times a week while raging inside his 6-foot-two frame because he couldn't understand what was attacking him from within. my mother, poor fish, wanting to be happy, beaten two or three times a week, telling me to be happy: "Henry, smile! why don't you ever smile?" and then she would smile, to show me how, and it was the saddest smile I ever saw one day the goldfish died, all five of them, they floated on the water, on their sides, their eyes still open, and when my father got home he threw them to the cat there on the kitchen floor and we watched as my mother smiled Charles Bukowski www.PoemHunter.com - The World's Poetry Archive 9 Alone With Everybody the flesh covers the bone and they put a mind in there and sometimes a soul, and the women break vases against the walls and the men drink too much and nobody finds the one but keep looking crawling in and out of beds. flesh covers the bone and the flesh searches for more than flesh. there's no chance at all: we are all trapped by a singular fate. nobody ever finds the one. the city dumps fill the junkyards fill the madhouses fill the hospitals fill the graveyards fill nothing else fills. Anonymous submission. Charles Bukowski www.PoemHunter.com - The World's Poetry Archive 10