Come on In! - Charles Bukowski [3]
what did I want them to make him
look like?
act like?
he was just a journalist from
Michigan who liked to shoot
big game
and his last kill was his
biggest;
surely he would have deserved the
nice buns
and the adoring eyes
of that actress who
he never saw and
who
in real life
later
drank herself to
death.
(the actor
who plays Hem
in the film is
still around
however
but barely
functioning.)
I guess when I look at that
movie
all I can think of to say
is:
bwana, bring me a
drink.
Coronado Street: 1954
listen, I been in the navy and I never heard cussing like you and
your girlfriend, man, and it lasts all night, every night.
we got religious people here, children, decent working folk, you’re
keeping them awake every night and look at this place! everything’s
broken, when I evict you you’ve got to pay to replace everything, buddy!
what do you mean, you don’t have no fucking money?
what do you buy all that booze with?
credit?
don’t give me that!
listen, I want it so quiet in here tonight we’ll be able to hear the
church mice pray!
what’s that?
well, up yours too, buddy!
and you wanna know what?
I saw your old lady sucking some guy’s banana in the alley!
you don’t give a damn?
what do you give a damn about?
nothing?
what kind of shit is that, nothing!
did you get a lobotomy somewhere along the way?
I got a good mind to wipe up the floor with you!
you say I’m the one with a lobotomy?
hey, don’t go closing the door on me, pal!
I own this fucking place!
OPEN UP, BUDDY! I’M COMING IN!
WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU LAUGHING AT?
HEY, WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU LAUGHING AT?
a vision
we are in the clubhouse
3rd race, 83 degrees in June,
they have just sent in a 40-to-1 shot
in a maiden race,
the tote has clicked 3 or 4 times,
the old general feeling of futility
has arrived early
and then a girl walks by
to the window to make a bet
her skirt is slit
almost to the waist
and as she walks
this
most beautiful leg
is exposed
it sneaks out as she walks
flashes and vanishes.
every male in the clubhouse
watches that leg.
the girl is with a woman
who looks like her mother
and her mother keeps close
to the side of the skirt
that is slit,
trying to block our view.
the girl makes her bet
turns and now the leg is on
the other side
along with her mother.
the girl disappears down an
aisle to her seat
as all around us
there is a rising,
silent applause.
then the applause stops
and like forsaken children
we go back to our
Racing Forms.
cut-rate drugstore: 4:30 p.m.
this woman at the counter ahead of me
was buying four pairs of panties:
yellow, pink, blue and orange.
the lady at the register kept picking up
the panties and
counting them:
one, two, three, four.
then she counted them again:
one, two, three, four.
will there be anything else?
she asked the lady who was buying the
panties.
no, that’s it, she answered.
no cigarettes or anything?
no, that’s it.
the woman at the register
rang up the sale
collected the money
gave change
looked off into the distance
for a bit
and then she bent under the counter
and got a bag
and put the panties in this bag
one at a time—
first the blue pair, then the yellow,
then the orange, then the pink.
she looked at me next:
how are you doing today?
fair, I said.
is there anything else?
cigarettes?
all I want is what you see in front of
you.
I had hemorrhoid ointment
laxatives
and a box of paper clips.
she rang it up, took my money, made
change, bagged my things, handed them
to me.
have a nice day, she did not say.
and you too,
I said.
you can’t tell a turkey by its feathers
son, my father said, if you only had some
ambition! you have no
get up and go! no
drive!
it’s hard for me to believe that you are really
my son.
yeah, I
said.
I mean, he went on, how are you going to
make it?
your mother is worried sick and the neighbors
think you’re some kind of
imbecile.
what are you going to
do?
we can’t take care of you all your
life!
I’m 15 now, I told him, I