The Pleasures of the Damned - Charles Bukowski [30]
ah, you’re too stupid to be cut like grass,
you’re too stupid to let anything violate you—
the girls won’t use their knives on you
they don’t want to
their sharp edge is wasted on you,
you are interested only in baseball games and
western movies and grass blades.
can’t you take just one of my knives?
here’s an old one—stuck into me in 1955,
she’s dead now, it wouldn’t hurt much.
I can’t give you this last one—
I can’t pull it out yet,
but here’s one from 1964, how about taking
this 1964 one from me?
man mowing the lawn across the way from me
don’t you have a knife somewhere in your gut
where love left?
man mowing the lawn across the way from me
don’t you have a knife somewhere deep in your heart
where love left?
man mowing the lawn across the way from me
don’t you see the young girls walking down the sidewalks now
with knives in their purses?
don’t you see their beautiful eyes and dresses and
hair?
don’t you see their beautiful asses and knees and
ankles?
man mowing the lawn across the way from me
is that all you see—those grass blades?
is that all you hear—the drone of the mower?
I can see all the way to Italy
to Japan
to the Honduras
I can see the young girls sharpening their knives
in the morning and at noon and at night, and
especially at night, o,
especially at night.
oh, yes
there are worse things than
being alone
but it often takes de cades
to realize this
and most often
when you do
it’s too late
and there’s nothing worse
than
too late.
poop
I remember, he told me, that when I was 6 or
7 years old my mother was always taking me
to the doctor and saying, “he hasn’t pooped.”
she was always asking me, “have you
pooped?”
it seemed to be her favorite question.
and, of course, I couldn’t lie, I had real problems
pooping.
I was all knotted up inside.
my parents did that to me.
I looked at those huge beings, my father,
my mother, and they seemed really stupid.
sometimes I thought they were just pretending
to be stupid because nobody could really be that
stupid.
but they weren’t pretending.
they had me all knotted up inside like a pretzel.
I mean, I had to live with them, they told
me what to do and how to do it and when.
they fed, housed and clothed me.
and worst of all, there was no other place for
me to go, no other choice:
I had to stay with them.
I mean, I didn’t know much at that age
but I could sense that they were lumps
of flesh and little else.
dinnertime was the worst, a nightmare
of slurps, spittle and idiotic conversation.
I looked straight down at my plate and tried
to swallow my food but
it all turned to glue inside.
I couldn’t digest my parents or the food.
that must have been it, for it was hell for me
to poop.
“have you pooped?”
and there I’d be in the doctor’s office once again.
he had a little more sense than my parents but
not much.
“well, well, my little man, so you haven’t pooped?”
he was fat with bad breath and body odor and
had a pocket watch with a large gold chain
that dangled across his gut.
I thought, I bet he poops a load.
and I looked at my mother.
she had large buttocks,
I could picture her on the toilet,
sitting there a little cross-eyed, pooping.
she was so placid, so
like a pigeon.
poopers both, I knew it in my heart.
disgusting people.
“well, little man, you just can’t poop,
huh?”
he made a little joke of it: he could,
she could, the world could.
I couldn’t.
“well, now, we’re going to give you
these pills.
and if they don’t work, then guess
what?”
I didn’t answer.
“come on, little man, tell me.”
all right, I decided to say it.
I wanted to get out of there:
“an enema.”
“an enema,” he smiled.
then he turned to my mother.
“and are you all right, dear?”
“oh, I’m fine, doctor!”
sure she was.
she pooped whenever she wanted.
then we would leave the office.
“isn’t the doctor a nice man?”
no answer from me.
“isn