Charles Bukowski - Play the Piano Like a Percussion Instrument Until the Fingers Begin to Bleed a Bit

poems like gunslingers sit around and shoot holes in my windows chew on my toilet paper read the race results take the phone off the hook. poems like gunslingers ask me what the hell my game is, and would I like to shoot it out? take it easy, I say, the race is not to the swift. the poem sitting at the south end of the couch draws says balls off for that one! take it easy, pardner, I have plans for you. plans, huh? what plans? The New Yorker , pard. he puts his iron away. fuck off I say whos running this game? were running this game say all the gunslingers drawing iron: get with it! so here you are: this poem was the one who was sitting on top of the refrigerator flipping beercaps. and now Ive got him out of the way and all the others are sitting around pointing their weapons at me and saying: Im next, Im next, Im next! I suppose that when I die the leftovers will jump some other poor son of a bitch.

I suck on this beer in my kitchen and think about cleaning my fingernails and shaving as I listen to the classical radio station. they play holiday music. they play holiday music.

I prefer to hear Christmas music in July while I am being threatened with death by a woman. thats when I need it thats when I need Bing Crosby and the elves and some fast reindeer. now I sit here listening to this slop in seasonits such a sugar tit Id rather play a game of ping-pong with the risen ghost of Hitler. amateur drunks run their cheerful cars into each other the ambulances sing to each other outside.

the Waxmans, she said, he starved, all these builders wanted to buy him; he worked in Paris in London and even in Africa, he had his own concept of design what the fuck? I said, a starving architect, eh? yes, yes, he starved and his wife and his children but he was true to his ideals. youre always so fucking nasty, she said, knocking over her tall-stemmed glass of scotch and water. uh huh, I said, in honor of the dead.

there are 4 or 5 guys at the racetrack bar. there is a mirror behind the bar. the reflections are not kind of the 4 or 5 guys at the racetrack bar. there are many bottles at the racetrack bar. we order different drinks. there is a mirror behind the bar. the reflections are not kind. it dont take brains to beat the horses, it just takes money and guts. our reflections are not kind. the clouds are outside. the sun is outside. the horses are warming up outside. we stand at the racetrack bar. we stand at the racetrack bar.

Ive been playing the races for 40 years and I still cant beat them. you can play the races for another 40 years and you still wont beat them. the bartender doesnt like us. the 5 minute warning buzzer sounds. we finish our drinks and turn away to make our bets. 4 or 5 guys from the racetrack bar. what shit. nobody wins. ask Caesar.

after the slaughterhouse there was a bar around the corner and I sat in there and watched the sun go down through the window, a window that overlooked a lot full of tall dry weeds.

after the slaughterhouse there was a bar around the corner and I sat in there and watched the sun go down through the window, a window that overlooked a lot full of tall dry weeds.

I never showered with the boys at the plant after work so I smelled of sweat and blood. the smell of sweat lessens after a while but the blood-smell begins to fulminate and gain power. I smoked cigarettes and drank beer until I felt good enough to board the bus with the souls of all those dead animals riding with me; heads would turn slightly women would rise and move away from me. when I got off the bus I only had a block to walk and one stairway up to my room where Id turn on my radio and light a cigarette and nobody minded me at all.

she had an uncle who sniffed her panties by firelight while eating crackerjack and muffins with honey, she sat across from me in that Chinese place the drinks kept coming and she talked about Matisse, Iranian coins, fingerbowls at Cambridge, Pound at Salerno, Plato at Madagascar, the death of Schopenhauer, and the times she and I had been together and ebullient. then she said it didnt matter anymore and I felt like saying what do you mean it doesnt matter anymore? how can you say it about anything, least of all us? where are your eyes and your feet and your head? if the thin blue marching of troops is correct, we are all about to be murdered.

it feels good to be driven about in a red porsche by a woman better read than I am. it feels good to be driven about in a red porsche by a woman who can explain things about classical music to me. it feels good to be driven about in a red porsche by a woman who buys things for my refrigerator and my kitchen: cherries, plums, lettuce, celery, green onions, brown onions, eggs, muffins, long chilis, brown sugar, Italian seasoning, oregano, white wine vinegar, pompeian olive oil and red radishes. it feels good to be driven about in a red porsche by a woman who buys things for my refrigerator and my kitchen: cherries, plums, lettuce, celery, green onions, brown onions, eggs, muffins, long chilis, brown sugar, Italian seasoning, oregano, white wine vinegar, pompeian olive oil and red radishes.

I like being driven about in a red porsche while I smoke cigarettes in gentle languor. Im lucky. Ive always been lucky: even when I was starving to death the bands were playing for me. but the red porsche is very nice and she is too, and Ive learned to feel good when I feel good. its better to be driven around in a red porsche than to own one.

which reminds me I shacked with Jane for 7 years she was a drunk I loved her my parents hated her I hated my parents it made a nice foursome one day we went on a picnic together up in the hills and we played cards and drank beer and ate potato salad and weenies they talked to her as if she were a living person at last everybody laughed I didnt laugh. later at my place over the whiskey I said to her, I dont like them but its good they treated you nice. you damn fool, she said, dont you see? see what? they keep looking at my beer-belly, they think Im pregnant. oh, I said, well heres to our beautiful child. heres to our beautiful child, she said. we drank them down.

our marriage book, it says.

our marriage book, it says.

I look through it. they lasted ten years. they were young once. now I sleep in her bed. he phones her: I want my drill back. have it ready.

Ill pick the children up at ten. when he arrives he waits outside the door. his children leave with him. she comes back to bed and I stretch a leg out place it against hers. I was young once too. human relationships simply arent durable.

I think back to the women in my life. they seem non-existent. did he get his drill? I ask. yes, he got his drill. I wonder if Ill ever have to come back for my bermuda shorts and my record album by The Academy of St.

torn by a temporary wind we come back together again check walls and ceilings for cracks and the eternal spiders wonder if there will be one more woman now 40,000 flies running the arms of my soul singing I met a million dollar baby in a 5 and 10 cent store arms of my soul? flies? singing? what kind of shit is this? its so easy to be a poet and so hard to be a man.