Doom is Like the Handle of a Pot

HA HA HA HA HA, HA HA
—Charles Bukowski

monkey feet
small and blue
walking toward you
as the back of a building falls off
and an airplane chews the white sky,
doom is like the handle of a pot,
it's there,
know it,
have ice in your tea,
marry,
have children, visit your
dentist,
do not scream at night
even if you feel like screaming,
count ten
make love to your wife
or if your wife isn't there
if there isn't anybody there
count 20,
get up and walk to the kitchen
if you have a kitchen
and sit there sweating
at 3 a.m. in the morning
monkey feet
small and blue
walking toward you.

_____________________

THE LOSER
—Charles Bukowski

and the next I remembered I'm on a table,
everybody's gone: the head of bravery
under light, scowling, flailing me down...
and then some toad stood there, smoking a cigar:
and I got up and knocked him over a chair;
it was like a scene in a movie, and
he stayed there on his big rump and said
over and over: "Jesus, Jesus, whatsamatta wit
you?" and I got up and dressed,
the tape still on my hands, and when I got home
I tore the tape off my hands and
wrote my first poem,
and I've been fighting
ever since...

_______________________

IF WE TAKE—
—Charles Bukowski

if we take what we can see—
the engines driving us mad,
lovers finally hating;
this fish in the market
staring upward into our minds;
flowers rotting, flies web-caught;
riots, roars of caged lions,
clowns in love with dollar bills,
nations moving people like pawns;
daylight thieves with beautiful
nighttime wives and wines;
the crowded jails,
the commonplace unemployed,
dying grass, 2-bit fires;
men old enough to love the grave.

These things, and others, in content
show life swinging on a rotten axis.

But they've left us a bit of music
and a spiked show in the corner,
a jigger of scotch, a blue necktie,
a small volume of poems by Rimbaud,
a horse running as if the devil were
twisting his tail
over bluegrass and screaming, and then,
love again
like a streetcar turning the corner
on time,
the city waiting,
the wine and the flowers,
the water walking across the lake
and summer and winter and summer and summer
and winter again.

________________________

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets. Previously-published poems are okay for Medusa’s Kitchen, as long as you own the rights. (Please cite publication.)