Giving Bukowski his due

I have been staying this past weekend with a very cool German artist friend.... and he just happens to be a big Bukowski fan as well. Seeing all of those volumes of his work lying around the apartment has reminded that a few weeks back I was just too darned lazy to seek out and post the full text of his poem 'Beer', which I had referred to, and quoted in brief.

Well, better late than never.

Beer

I don’t know how many bottles of beer
I have consumed while waiting for things
to get better.
I don't know how much wine and whisky
and beer
mostly beer
I have consumed after
splits with women -
waiting for the phone to ring,
waiting for the sound of footsteps;
and the phone never rings
until much later,
and the footsteps never arrive
until much later.
When my stomach is coming up
out of my mouth,
they arrive as fresh as spring flowers:
“What the hell have you done to yourself?
It will be 3 days before you can fuck me!”
The female is durable:
she lives seven and one half years longer
than the male, and she drinks very little beer
because she knows it's bad for the figure.
While we are going mad
they are out dancing and laughing
with horny cowboys.

Well, there’s beer -
sacks and sacks of empty beer bottles
and when you pick one up
the bottles fall through the wet bottom
of the paper sack
rolling
clanking
spilling gray wet ash
and stale beer,
or the sacks fall over at 4 a.m.
in the morning
making the only sound in your life.

beer
beer beer beer
rivers and seas of beer
the radio singing love songs
as the phone remains silent
and the walls stand
straight up and down
and beer is all there is.

Charles Bukowski (1920-1994)