to show they had it. While I was watching they took one guy in an elevator and rode him up and down, up and down, and when he got out, you hardly knew who he was, or what he had been - a black screaming about Human Rights. Then they got a white guy, screaming something about CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS; four or five of them got him, and they rushed him off his feet so fast he couldn't walk, and when they brought him back they leaned him against a wall, and he just stood there trembling, these red welts all over his body, he stood there trembling and shivering. I got my photo taken all over again. Fingerprinted all over again. They took me down to the drunk tank, opened that door. After that, it was just a matter of looking for floorspace among the 150 men in the room. One shitpot. Vomit and piss everywhere. I found a spot among my fellow men. I was Charles Bukowski, fea- tured in the literary archives of the University of California at Santa Barbara. Somebdy there thought I was a genius. I stretched out on the boards. Heard a young voice. A boy's voice. "Mista, I'll suck your dick for a quarter!" They were supposed to take all your change, bills, ident, keys, knives, so forth, plus cigarettes, and then you had the property slip. Which you either lost or sold or had stolen from you. But there was always still money and cigarettes about. "Sorry, lad," I told him, "They took my last penny." Four hours later I managed to sleep. There. Best man at a Zen wedding, and I'd bet they, the bride and groom, hadn't even fucked that night. But somebody had been. === **AN EVIL TOWN** Frank walked down the steps. He didn't like elevators. He didn't like many things. He disliked steps less than he disliked elevators. The desk clerk called to him: "Mr. Evans! Would you step over here, please?" The desk clerk's face looked like cornmeal mush. It was all Frank could do to keep from hitting him. The desk clerk looked about the lobby, then leaned very close. "Mr. Evans, we've been watching you." The desk clerk again looked about the lobby, saw that there wasn't anybody near, then leaned forward again. "Mr. Evans, we've been watching you and we believe that you're losing your mind." The desk clerk leaned back then and looked right at Frank. "I feel like going to a movie," said Frank. "You know of any good movies in town? "Let's stick to the subject, Mr. Evans." "O.k., I'm losing my mind. Anything else?" The clerk reached under the counter and came up with some- thing wrapped in cellophane. "Here it is, Mr. Evans." Frank dropped it in his coat pocket and walked outside. It was a cool autumn night and he walked down the street, west. He stopped at the first alley, stepped in. He reached into his coat and got the wrapped-up thing, peeled the cellophane off. It looked like cheese. It smelled like cheese. He took a bite. It tasted like cheese. He ate it all, then stepped out of the alley and walked down the street again. He turned into the first movie house he saw, bought his ticket and walked into the darkness. He took a seat in the back. There weren't many people in there. The whole place smelled like urine. The women on the screen dressed as they did in the '20's and the men wore vaseline on their hair, combed it back hard and straight. Their noses seemed very long and the men also seemed to have mascara under their eyes. It wasn't even a talkie. Words showed under the film: BLANCHE WAS NEW IN THE BIG CITY. A guy with straight greasy hair was making Blanche drink from a bottle of gin. Blanche appeared to be getting drunk. BLANCHE GREW DIZZY. SUDDENLY HE KISSED HER. Frank looked around. Everywhere heads seemed to be bob- bing. There weren't any women in the place. The guys seemed to be sucking each other off. They went at it and at it. They never seemed to get tired. The men sitting alone seemed to be jacking-off. The cheese had been good. He wished the clerk had given him more cheese. HE BEGAN TO DISROBE BLANCHE. And every time he looked around this guy was getting nearer to him. Then when Frank looked back at the movie the guy would move 2 or 3 seats nearer to him. HE MADE LOVE TO BLANCHE WHILE SHE WAS HELP- LESSLY INTOXICATED. He looked again. The guy was 3 seats away. Breathing heavily. Then the guy was in the seat next to him. "Oh shit," the guy said, "O, mys shit, ooo,ooo,oooo. ah, ah! eeeyew! oh!" WHEN BLANCHE AWAKENED THE NEXT MORNING SHE REALIZED THAT SHE HAD BEEN RAVISHED. The guy smelled as if he had never wiped his ass. The guy was leaning toward him, bits of spit drooling from the sides of his mouth. Frank hit the button of the switchblade: "Careful!" he told the guy. "You get any closer you might hurt yourself on this!" "Oh, my god!" said the guy. He got up and ran down the row of seats to the aisle, then walked quickly down the aisle to the front row. Two guys were at it. One guy was jacking-off the other guy as the guy went down on him. The guy who had been bothering Frank sat there and watched them. SOON AFTER, BLANCHE WAS IN A HOUSE OF PROSTI- TUTION. Then Frank had to urinate. He got up and walked toward the sign: MEN. He went in. It really stank in there. He gagged, opened the toilet door, went in. He took out his penis and started to piss. Then he heard some sounds. "Ooooh ooooh, you filthy fuck!" said the guy. "ooh you beasly fiendish piece of shit!" He heard the guy ripping off toilet paper and wiping his face. Then the guy began to cry. Frank stepped out of the toilet, washed his hands. He didn't want to see any more of the movie. Then he was out on the street, walking back toward his hotel. Then he was in the lobby. The desk clerk nodded him over. "Yeah?" asked Frank. "Look, Mr. Evans, I'm sorry. I was just kidding you." "About what?" "You know." "No, I don't know." "Well, about losing your mind. I've been drinking, you know. Don't tell anybody or I'll lose my job. But I've been drinking. I know that you're not losing your mind. I was just joking." "But I am losing my mind," said Frank, "and thanks for the cheese." Then he turned and walked up the stairway. When he got to his room he sat down at the writing desk. He took out the switch- blade, hit the button, looked at the knifeblade. It was well sharp- ened down one entire side. It could stab or slice. He hit the button and put the knife back in his pocket. Then Frank found pen and paper and began to write: "Dear Mother: This is an evil town. The Devil is in control. Sex is everywhere and it is not being used as an instrument of Beauty as God meant it to be, but as an instrument of Evil. Yes, it has most certainly fallen into the devil's hands, into Evil hands. Young girls are forced to drink gin, then they are deflowered by these beasts and forced into houses of prostitution. It is terrible. It is unbelievable. My heart is torn. I walked along the shore yesterday. Not along the shore, real- ly, but up along on top of cliffs and then I stopped and sat there while breathing in the Beauty. The sea, the sky, the sand. Life be- came the Eternal Bliss. Then a most miraculous thing happened. 3 small squirrels saw me from way down below and they began to climb the cliffs. I saw their little faces peeking at me from behind rocks and crevices in the cliffs as they climbed toward me. Finally they were at my feet. Their eyes looked at me. Never, Mother, have I seen more beautiful eyes - undiluted by Sin: the whole sky, the whole sea, Eternity was in those eyes. Finally I moved and they-" There was a knock on the door. Frank got up, walked over, opened it. It was the desk clerk. "Mr. Evans, please, I must speak to you." "All right, come in." The desk clerk closed the door and stood in front of Frank. The desk clerk smelled like wine. "Mr. Evans, please don't tell management about our misunder- standing." "I don't know what you're talking about." "You're a great guy, Mr. Evans. You know, I've been drink- ing." "You are forgiven. Now go." "Mr. Evans, there's something I've got to tell you." "Very well. What is it?" "I'm in love with you, Mr. Evans." "Oh, you mean my spirit, eh, my boy?" "No, your body, Mr. Evans." "What?" "Your body, Mr. Evans. Please don't be offended, but I want you to ream me!" "REAM ME, Mr. Evans! I've been reamed by half the United States Navy! Those boys know what's good, Mr. Evans. There's nothing like a bit of clean round-eye!" "You will leave my room immediately!" The desk clerk threw his arms about Frank's neck, then his mouth was on Frank's mouth. The desk clerk's mouth was very wet and cold, it stank. Frank pushed him away. "You rotten bastard! YOU KISSED ME!" "I love you, Mr. Evans!" "You filthy swine!" Frank had the knife, hit the button, the blade jumped out and he stuck it into the desk clerk's stomach. Then pulled it out. "Mr. Evans- my god-" The clerk fell to the floor. He was holding both hands over the wound trying to stop the blood. "You bastard! YOU KISSED ME!" Frank reached down and unzipped the desk clerk's fly. Then he got the clerk's penis, pulled it straight up toward him and sliced it off three- quarters of the way down. "Oh, my god my god my god my god-" said the clerk. Frank walked to the bathroom, took the thing and threw it into the toilet. Then he flushed the toilet. Then he washed his hands very well with soap and water. He came out, sat down to the disk again. He picked up the pen. "-ran away but I had seen Eternity. Mother, I must move from this city, from this hotel - the Devil is in control of almost all the bodies. I will write you again from the next city - perhaps San Francisco, Portland or Seattle. I feel like moving north. I think of you continually and hope that you are happy and in good health, and may the Lord be with you always. love, your son, Frank" He wrote the address on the envelope, sealed it, added stamp and then walked over and put it in the inside pocket of his coat which was hanging in the closet. Then he took a suitcase from the closet, put it on the bed, opened it and began to pack. === TWELVE FLYING MONKEYS WHO WON'T COPULATE PROPERLY The bell rings and I open the side window by the door. It is night. "Who is it?" I ask. Somebody walks up to the window but I can't see the face. I have two lights over the typewriter. I slam the window but there is talking out there. I sit down to the typewriter but there is still talking out there. I get up and rip open the door and scream: "I TOLD YOU COCKSUCKERS NOT TO BOTHER ME!" I look around and there is one guy standing on the bottom of the steps and another guy standing on the porch, pissing; He is pissing into a bush to the left of the porch, standing on the edge of the porch, his piss arching in a heavy swath, upward and then down into the bush. "Hey, this guy is pissing into my bush," I say. the guy laughs and keeps pissing. I grab him by the pants, pick him up and throw him, still pissing, over the top of the bush and into the night. He doesn't return. The other guy says, "What did you do that for?" "I felt like it." "Drunk?" I ask. He walks around the corner and is gone. I close the door and sit down to the typer again. All right, I have this mad scientist, he's taught monkeys to fly, he's got eleven monkey's with these wings. The monkeys are very good. The scientist has even taught them to race. Race around these pylons, yes. Now let's see. Gotta make it good. To get rid of a story you gotta have fucking, lots of it, if possible. Better make it twelve monkeys, six male and six of the other kind. All right now. Here they go. There they go around the first pylon. How am I going to get them to fucking? I haven't sold a story in two months. I should have stayed in the goddamned post office. All right. There they go. Around the first pylon. Maybe they just fly off. Suddenly. How about that? They fly to Washington, D.C. and hang around the Capitol dropping turds on the public, pissing on them, smearing their turds across the White House. Can I have one drop a turd on the President? No, that's asking too much. Okay, make it a turd on the Secretary of State. Orders are given to shoot them out of the sky. That's tragic, isn't it? But what about the fucking? All right. All right. Work it in. Let's see. Okay, ten of them are shot out of the sky, poor little things. There are only two others. A male and one other kind. They can't seem to be found. Then a cop is walking through the park one night, and there they are, the last two of them, wings strapped on, fucking like the devil. The cop walks up. The male hears, turns his head, looks up, gives a silly little monkey-grin, never missing a stroke, then turns his head and goes back to banging. The cop blows his head off. The monkey's head, that is. The female flips the male off in disgust and stands up. For a monkey, she is a pretty little thing. For a moment the cop thinks of, thinks of - But no, it would be too tight, maybe, and she might bite, maybe. While he's thinking this, the bullet, she falls. He runs up. She is wounded but not dead. The cop looks around, lifts her up, takes it out, tries to work it in. No good. Just room for the head. Shit. He drops her to the ground, puts his gun to her brain and B A M! it's over. The bell rings again. I open the door. Three guys walk in. Always these guys. A woman never pisses on my porch, a woman hardly ever comes by. How am I going to get any sex ideas? I have almost forgotten how to do it. But they say it's like riding a bicycle, you never forget. It's better than riding a bi- cycle. It's Crazy Jack and two guys I don't know. "Look, Jack," I say, "I thought I was rid of you." Jack just sits down. The other two guys sit down. Jack has promised me never to come by again but he is on the wine most of the time, so promises don't mean much. He lives with his mother and pretends to be a painter. I know four or five guys living with or supported by their mother, and the guys pretend to genius. And all the mothers are alike: "Oh, Nelson has a painting hanging at the Warner-Finch Galleries this week. His genius is being recognized at last! He's asking $4,000 for the work. Do you think that's too much?" Nelson, Jack, Biddy, Norman, Jimmy and Ketya, Fuck. Jack has on blue jeans, is barefooted, no shirt, undershirt, just a brown shawl thrown over him. One guy has a beard and grins and blushes continually. The other guy is just fat. Some kind of leech. "Have you seen Borst lately?" Jack asks. "No." "Let me have one of your beers." "No. You guys come around, drink all my shit, split and leave me on a dry shore." "All right." He leaps up, runs out and gets his wine bottle which he has hidden under the cushion on the porch chair. He comes back, takes off the lid, takes a suck. "I was down at Venice with this chick and one hundred rain- bows. I thought I spotted the heat and I ran up to Borst's place with this chick and the hundred rainbows. I knocked on the door and told him, "Quick, let me in! I've got one hundred rainbows and the heat is right behind me!" Borst closed the door, I kicked it in and ran in with the chick. Borst was on the floor, jacking off some guy. I ran into the bathroom with the chick and locked the door. Borst knocked. I said, "Don't you dare come in here!" I stayed in there with the chick for about an hour. We knocked off two pieces of ass to amuse ourselves. Then we came out." "Did you dump the rainbows?" "Hell no, it was a false alarm. But Borst was very angry." "Shit," I say, "Borst hasn't written a decent poem since 1955. His mother supports him. Pardon me. But I mean, all he does is look at TV, eat these delicate little celeries and greens and jog along the beach in his dirty underwear. He used to be a fine poet when he was living with those young boys in Arabia. But I can't sympathize. A winner goes wire to wire. It's like Huxley said, Aldous, that is, 'Any man can be a-'" "How you doing?" Jack asks. "Nothing but rejects," I say. The one guy begins playing the flute. The leech just sits there Jack lifts his wine bottle. It is a beautiful night in Hollywood, Cali- fornia. Then the guy who lives in the court behind me falls out of bed, drunk. It makes quite a sound. I'm used to it. I'm used to the whole court. All of them sit in their places, shades drawn. They get up at noon. Their cars sit out front dust-covered, tires going down, batteries weakening. They mix drink with dope and have no visible means of support. I like them. They don't bother me. The guy gets into bed again, falls out. "You silly damn fool," you hear him say, "get back into that bed." "What's all that noise?" Jack asks. "Guy behind me. He's very lonely. Drinks a beer now and then. His mother died last year and left him twenty grand. He sits around and masturbates and looks at baseball games and cowboy shootums on TV. Used to be a gas station attendant. "We've got to split." says Jack, "want to come with us?" "No," I say. They explain that it is something to do with the House of Seven Gables. They are going to see somebody who had something to do with the House of Seven Gables. It isn't the writer, the produc- er, the actors, it is somebody else. "Well, no," I say, and they all run out. It is a beautiful sight. Then I sit down to the monkeys again. Maybe I can juggle those monkeys up. If I can get all twelve of them fucking at once! That's it! But how? And why? Check the Royal Ballet of London. But why? I'm going crazy. Okay, the Royal Ballet of London has this idea. Twelve monkeys flying while they ballet. Only before the performance somebody gives them all the Spanish Fly. Not the bal- let. The monkeys. But the Spanish Fly is a myth, isn't it? Okay, enter another mad scientist with a real Spanish Fly! No, no, oh my God, I just can't get it right! The phone rings. I pick it up. It's Borst: "Hello, Hank?" "Yeah?" "I have to keep it short. I'm broke." "Yes, Jerry." "Well, I lost my two sponsors. The stock market and the tight dollar." "Uh huh." "Well, I always knew it was going to happen. So I'm getting out of Venice. I can't make it here. I'm going to New York City." "What?" "I thought that's what you said." "Well, I'm broke you see, and I think I can really make it there." "Sure, Jerry." "Losing my sponsors is the best thing that ever happened to me." "Really?" "Now I feel like fighting again. You've heard about people rotting along the beach. Well, that's what I've been doing down here: rotting. I've got to get out of here. And I'm not worried. Except for the trunks." "I can't seem to get them packed. So my mother's coming back here." "All right, Jerry." "But before I go to New York I'm going to stop off at Switzer- land and perhaps Greece. Then I'm coming back to New York." "All right, Jerry, keep in touch. Always good to hear." Then I am back to the monkeys again. Twelve monkeys who can fly, fucking. How can it be done? Twelve bottles of beer are gone. I find my reserve half-pint of scotch in the refrigerator. I mix one-third glass scotch with two-thirds water. I should have stayed in the goddamned post office. But even here, like this, you have a minor chance. Just get those twelve monkey's fucking. If you'd been born a camel boy in Arabia you wouldn't even have this chance. So get your back up and get those monkeys at it. You've been blessed with a minor talent and you're not in India where probably two dozen boys could write you under if they knew how to write. Well, maybe not two dozen, maybe just a round dozen. I finish the half-pint, drink half bottle of wine, go to bed, forget it. The next morning at nine a.m. the doorbell rings. There is a young black girl standing there with a stupid-looking white guy in rimless glasses. They tell me that I have made a promise to go boat- ing with them at a party three nights ago. I get dressed, get into the car with them. They drive to an apartment and a black-haired kid met him at a party. He passes out little orange life-belts. Next I know we're down at the pier. I can't tell the pier from the water. They help me down a swinging wooden contraption that leads to a floating dock. The bottom of the contraption and the dock are about three feet apart. They help me down. "What the fuck is this?" I ask. "Does anybody have a drink?" I am with the wrong people. Nobody has a drink. Then I am in a small rowboat, rented, and somebody has attached a half-horse- power motor. The bottom of the boat is filled with water and two dead fish. I don't know who the people are. They know me. Fine, fine. We head out to sea. I vomit. We pass a suckerfish wrapped around a flying monkey. No, that's terrible. I vomit again. "How's the great writer?" asks the stupid-looking guy in the prow of the boat, the guy with the rimless galsses. "What a great writer?" asks the stupid-looking guy in the prow of the boat, the guy with the rimless glasses. "What great writer?" I ask, thinking he is talking about Rim- baud, although I never thought Rimbaud a great writer. "You," he says. "Me?" I say, "Oh, fine. Think I'm going to Greece next year." "Grease?" he says. "You mean up your ass?" "No," I answer, "up yours." We head out to sea where Conrad made it. To hell with Con- rad. I'll take coke with bourbon in a dark bedroom in Hollywood in 1970, or whatever year you read this. The year of the monkey-orgy that never happened. The motor flits and gnashes at the sea; we plunge on toward Ireland. No, it's the Pacific. We plunge on toward Japan. To hell with it. === 10 jackoffs old Sanchez is a genius but I am the only one who knows it and it's always good to go see him. there are very few people I can stay in a room with more than 5 minutes without feeling gutted. Sanchez passes my tests, and I am very test, hehehehe, oh my god, anyhow, I go to see him now and then in his hand-built two story shack. he installed his own plumbing, has a free-feed line from a high-power voltage line, has connected himself up a telephone which feeds underground from a neighbor's installation, but he explains to me that he cannot call long distance or out of the city without exposing his sycophancy. he even lives with a young woman who says very little, paints, walks about looking sexy and makes love to him and him to her, of course. he bought the ground for very little and although the place is some distance from Los Angeles, you might call this an advantage. he sits among wires, popular mechanics magazines, tape recording sets, shelves and shelves of books on all subjects. he is concise, never rude; he is humorous and magic, he writes very well but is not interested in fame, once in a great while he will come out from his cave and read his poetry at some university, and it is said that the walls and the ivy tremble and shake for weeks afterwards along with the co-eds, he has taped 10,000 tapes of con- versation, sounds, music-dull and undull, usual and otherwise. the walls are covered with photos, advertisements, drawings, hunks of rock, snake skins, skulls, dried rubbers, soot, silver and spots of golddust. "I'm afraid I'm cracking," I tell him, "eleven years on the same job, the hours dragging over me like wet shit, wow, and all the faces melted down to zeros, yapping, laughing at nothing. I'm no snob, Sanchez, but sometimes it gets to be a real horror show and the only end is death or madness." "sanity is an imperfection," he says, dropping a couple of pills into his mouth. "jesus, I mean, I'm taught at several universities, some prof is writing a book on me- I've been translated into several lan- guages-" "we all have. you're getting old, Bukowski, you're weakening. keep your moxie. Victory or Death." "Adolph." "Adolph." "large gamble, large loss." "right, or invert it for the common man." "well, fuck." "yeah." "it gets quiet for a while, then he says, "you can come live with us." "thanks, sure, man. but I think I'll try a little more moxie first." "your game." "Over his head is a black sign upon which he has pasted in white type: "A BOY HAS NEVER WEPT, NOR DASHED A THOUSAND KIM." -Dutch Schultz, on his deathbed. WITH ME, GRAND OPERA IS THE BERRIES." -Al Capone "NE CRAIGNEZ POINT, MONSIEUR, LE TORTURE." -Leibnetz. "THERE IS NO MORE." -Motto of Sitting Bull "THE POLICEMAN'S CLIENT IS THE ELECTRIC CHAIR." -George Jessel. "FAST AND LOOSE IN ONE THING, FAST AND LOOSE IN EVERYTHING. I NEVER KNEW IT FAIR. NO MORE WILL YOU, NOR NO ONE. -Detective Bucket. "AMEN IS THE INFLUENCE OF NUMBERS." -Pico Della Mirandola, in his kabbalistic conclusions "SUCCESS AS THE RESULT OF INDUSTRY IS A PEAS- ANT IDEAL." -Wallace Stevens "TO ME, MY SHIT STINKS BETTER EXCEPT THAN A DOG'S." -Charles Bukowski. "NOW THE PORNOGRAPHERS WERE ASSEMBLED WITH IN THE CREMATORIUM." -Anthony Bloomfield. "ADAGE OF SPONTANEITY - THE BACHELOR GRINDS HIS CHOCOLATE HIMSELF." -Marcel Duchamp. "KISS THE HAND YOU CANNOT SEVER." -Taureg saying. "WE ALL, IN OUR DAY, WERE SMART FELLOWS." -Admiral St. Vincent. "MY DREAM IS TO SAVE THEM FROM NATURE." -Christian Dior. "OPEN SESAME - I WANT OUT." -Stanislas Jerzy Lec. "A YARDSTICK DOES NOT SAY THAT THE OBJECT TO BE MEASURED IS ONE YARD LONG." -Ludwig Wittgenstein. I am a bit gone on beer. "Say, I like that last one: "the object to be murdered does not have to be a yard long." "I think that's even better but it's not what is said." "all right. how's Kaakaa? that's baby-language for shit, and a more sexy woman I've never seen. "I know. and it started with Kafka. she used to like Kafka and I called her that. then she changed it herself." he gets up and walks to a photo. "come 'ere, Bukowski." I flip my beercan into the trashcan and walk on over. "what's this?" asks Sanchez. I look at the photo. it is a very good photo. "well, it looks like a cock." "what kind of cock?" " a stiff cock, a big one." "it's mine." "so?" "don't you notice?" "what?" "the sperm." "yes, I see it. I didn't want to say-" "why not? what the hell's wrong with you?" "I don't understand." "I mean, do you see the sperm or don't you?" "what do you mean?" "I mean, I'm JACKING OFF, can't you understand how hard that is to do?" "it's not hard, Sanchez, I do it all the time-" "oh, you ox! I mean I had the camera rigged-up with a string. Do you realize what an enactment it was to remain quietly in focus, ejaculate and trigger the camera at the same time?" "I don't use a camera." "how many men do? you miss the point, as usual. who the hell you are translated into the German, the Spanish, the French and so forth, I'll never know! look, do you realize that it took me THREE DAYS to make this SIMPLE photograph? do you know how many times I had to JACKOFF?" "4 times?" "TEN TIMES!" "oh, Lord! how about Kaakaa?" "she liked the photo." "I mean-" "good god, boy, I don't have the tongue to answer your sim- plicity." He goes on around back there and plops himself in his chair again. among his wires and pliers and translations and his huge BIT- TER-LEAP notebook, Adolph's nose glued to the black front with edgeworks of the Berlin bunker in the background. "I'm working on something now," I tell him, "short about me walking in to interview the great composer. he's drunk. I get drunk, there's a maid. we're on the wine. he leans forward and tells me, 'The Meek Shall Inherit the Earth,'-" "yeah?" "and then he says, 'translated that means that the stupid have the greatest persistency.'" "kind of lousy." he says, "but it's all right for you." "but I don't know what to do with the story. I've got the maid walking around in a very short thing and I don't know what to do with it. I thought I might save the story by whiplashing the maid with my belt buckle and then sucking the composer's dick. but I've never sucked dick, never felt like it, I'm square, so I left the story in the center and never finished it." "every man is a homo, a dick-sucker; every woman is a dyke, why do you worry so much?" "because if I'm happy I'm no good and I don't want to be no good." We sit there a while and then she comes from upstairs, the flaxen straight string hair. it's the first woman I could eat, I think. but she walks past Sanchez and his tongue licks his lips just a bit, she walks past me like separate ball-bearings of magic wavering crazy flesh, may the heavens kiss my balls if it is not so, and she waves through it all glorious as avalanche smashed by sun- "hello, Hank," she says. "Kaakaa," I laugh. she goes behind her table and begins her bits of painting and he sits there, Sanchez, beard blacker than black power, but calm calm, no claims. I begin to get drunk, say nasty things, say anything. then I begin to get dull. I mumble, I murmur. "Oh, sorry- ta spoil yr evening-so sorry, fuckers- ya-I'm a killer but I won't kill anybody. I got class. I'm Bukowski! translated into SEVEN LANGUAGES! I AM the ONE! BUKOWSKI!" I fall forward trying to look at the jackoff picture again, pitch over something. it is one of my own shoes. I have this god damn bad habit of taking off my own shoes. "Hank," she says, "be careful." "Bukowski?" he asks, "You all right?" he lifts me up. "man, I think you better stay here tonight." "NO GOD DAMN IT, I'M GOING TO THE WOOD- CHOPPERS BALL!" next thing I know he's got me over his shoulder, Sanchez has and he's carrying me to his upstairs pad, you know, where he and his woman do the thing, and then I'm down on the bed, he's gone. door closed, and then I hear some kind of music downstairs, and laughter, the both of them, but kind laughter, no malice, and I did not know what to do, one did not expect the best, luck or people everybody failed you finally, well, and then the door opened, a pop of light, and there was Sanchez - "hey, Bubu, a bottle of good French wine-sip it slowly, do you most good. you'll sleep. be happy. I won't say we love you, that's too easy. and if you want to come downstairs, dance and sing, talk, o.k. do what you want. here's the wine." he hands me the bottle. I lift it like some crazy cornet, again and again. through a ripped curtain a part of the worn moon leaps. it is a perfectly good night; it is not jail; it is far from that- in the morning when I awaken, go down to piss, come out from pissing, I find them both asleep on that narrow couch hardly enough for one body, but they are not one body and their faces together and asleep their bodies together and asleep, why be corny??? I only feel the tiny clutch at the throat, the automatic transmission blues of loveliness, that somebody has it, that they don't even hate me-that they even wish me what?- I walk out staunching and griefing and feeling and sick and blue and bukowski, old, starlit sun, my god, reaching into the final corner, the last midnight blast, cold Mr. C., big H, Mary Mary, clean as a bug on the wall, the heat of December a brainweb across my everlasting spine, Mercy like Kerouac's dead baby sprawled across Mexican railroad tracks in the everlasting July of suck-off tombs, I maybe writing this down by myself, leaving a few things out (I have been threatened by various powerful forces for doing things that are only normal and gaga gladful to do) and I get into my eleven year old car and now I have driven away find myself here and write you here a little illegal story of love beyond myself but, perhaps, understandable to you. yours truly, Sanchez and Bukowski p.s. - this time the Heat missed. don't keep more than you can swallow: love, heat or hate. === 3chickens Vicki was all right, but we had our troubles. we were on the wine. port, that woman would get drunk and get to talking and she would make up some of the vilest imaginable stuff about me. and that tone of voice. shoddy and lisping and grating and insane. it would get to any man. it got to me. once she was screaming these insanities from the fold-down bed in our apartment. I begged her to stop. but she wouldn't. finally, I just walked over, lifted up the bed with her in it and folded everything into the wall. then I went over and sat down and listened to her scream. but she kept screaming so I walked over and pulled the bed out of the wall again there she lay, holding her arm, claiming it was broken. "your arm can't be broken," I said. "it is, it is. oh, you slimy jackoff bastard, you've broken my arm!" I had some more drinks but she just kept holding her arm and whining. I finally had enough and telling her I'd be right back I went downstairs and outside and found some old wooden boxes behind a grocery store. I found good sturdy slats, ripped them off, pulled out the nails, got back on the elevator and rode back to our apartment. it took about 4 slats. I bound them around her arm with rippings from one of her dresses. she quieted down for a couple of hours. then she started in again. I couldn't take it anymore. so I called a taxi, we went to the General Hospital, as soon as the taxi left I took the boards off and threw them into the street. then they x-rayed her CHEST and put her arm in a cast. can you imagine that? I suppose if she broke her head they'd x-ray her ass. anyhow, she used to sit in the bars after that and say, "I am the only woman who has been folded into a wall in a wall bed." and I wasn't so sure of THAT either, but I let her go on saying it. now, another time she angered me and I slapped her but it was across the mouth and it broke her false teeth. I was surprised that it broke her false teeth. and I went out and got this super cement glue and I glued her teeth together for her. it worked for a while and then one night as she sat there drinking her wine she suddenly had a mouthful of broken teeth. that wine was so strong it undid the glue. it was disgusting. we had to get her some new teeth. how we did it, I don't quite remem- ber, but she claimed they made her look like a horse. we'd usually always have these arguments after we drank awhile, and Vicki claimed I'd get very mean when I was drunk but I think that she was the one who was mean. anyhow, sometime during the argument she'd get up, slam the door and run outside to some bar. "looking for a live one," as the girls would say. it always made me feel bad when she left. I've got to admit it. sometimes she wouldn't come back for 2 or 3 days. and nights. it wasn't a very nice thing to do. one time she ran out and I sat there drinking the wine, think- ing about it. then I got up and found the elevator and rode on down to the streets too. I found her in her favorite bar. she sat there holding a kind of purple scarf. I'd never seen the purple scarf before. holding out on me. I walked up to her and said quite loudly: "I've tried to make a woman out of you but you're nothing but a god damned whore!" the bar was full. every seat taken. I lifted my hand. I swung. I backhanded her off that god damned stool. she fell to the floor and screamed. this was at the back end of the bar. I didn't even turn to look at her. I walked the length of the bar to the exit. then I turned and faced the crowd. it was very quiet. "now," I said to them, "if there's anybody here who doesn't LIKE what I just did, just SAY something-" it was quieter than quiet. I turned around and walked out the doorway. the moment I hit the street I could hear them babbling and buzzing in there, buzzing and babbling. the SHITS! not a man in the boatload! - but, of course, she came back, and, well, anyhow to get on, this one night lately we are sitting around drinking the wine and the same old arguments started. this time I decided to go. I'M GONNA GET THE FUCK OUTA THIS HOLE!" I yelled at Vicki. "I CAN'T STAND NO MORE OF YOUR GOD DAMNED ABUSE!" she jumped in front of the door. "over my dead body, that's the only way you are getting out of here! "o.k., if that's the way it's gotta be." I slammed her a good one and she fell down in front of the doorway. I had to move her body to get out. I took the elevator down. feeling rather good. a good jaunty 4-floor ride down. the elevator was kind of a cage-like contraption and smelled like old stockings, old gloves, old dustmops, but it gave me a feeling of security and power - somehow - and the wine rode all through me. but then I got outside and had a change of mind. I went to the liquor store. bought 4 more bottles of wine and went back to my place and rode the elevator back up. the same feeling of security and power. I walked into my place. Vicki was sitting in a chair crying. "I've come back to you, you lucky darling," I told her. "you bastard, you hit me. YOU HIT ME!" "umm, I said, opening a new bottle. "and you give me any more shit and I'll hit you again." "YEAH!" she screamed, "YOU'D HIT ME BUT YOU WOULDN'T HAVE ENOUGH GUTS TO HIT A MAN!" "HELL NO!" I screamed back, "I WOULDN'T HIT A MAN! YOU THINK I'M CRAZY? WHAT'S THAT GOT TO DO WITH IT?" that settled her for a bit and we sat for a bit and we sat drinking down the waterglassfuls of wine, port. then she started in on her abusive stuff again, mostly claiming I jacked off while she was asleep. well, even if it were true I figured that was my business and if it wasn't, then she was REALLY crazy. she claimed I jacked off in the bathtub, in the closet, in the elevator, everywhere. everytime I got out of the tub she'd run into the bathroom, like: "there! I SEE IT! LOOK AT IT!" "you crazy bat, that's just the dirt-ring." "no, that's "COME! that's COME!" or she'd run in while I was bathing under the arms or between the legs and say, "see, see, SEE! you're DOING IT!" "doing WHAT? can't a man wash his BALLS? those are MY balls, god damn you! can't a man wash his own balls?" "what's that thing sticking up there?" "my left index finger. now get the HELL OUT OF HERE!!!