Charles Bukowski
Charles Bukowski
Henry Charles Bukowskiwas an American poet, novelist, and short story writer...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth16 August 1920
CityAndernach, Germany
CountryUnited States of America
heart hands giving
...in that drunken place you would like to hand your heart to her and say touch it but then give it back.
horse booze get-back
I'll get back to the whores and the horses and the booze, while there's time.
ass streets madhouses
Basically, that's why I wrote: to save my ass, to save my ass from the madhouse, from the streets, from myself.
dog children believe
I could scream down 90 mountains to less than dust if only one living human had eyes in the head and heart in the body, but there is no chance, my god, no chance. rat with rat dog with dog hog with hog, play the piano drunk listen to the drunk piano, realize the myth of mercy stand still as even a child's voice snarls and we have not been fooled, it was only that we wanted to believe.
jail goes-on forget
As we go on with our lives we tend to forget that the jails and the hospitals and the madhouses and the graveyards are packed.
morning pain moving
morning night and noon the traffic moves through and the murder and treachery of friends and lovers and all the people move through you. pain is the joy of knowing the unkindest truth that arrives without warning. life is being alone death is being alone. even the fools weep morning night and noon.
running simple sea
I suppose like others I have come through fire and sword, love gone wrong, head-on crashes, drunk at sea, and I have listened to the simple sound of water running in tubs and wished to drown
past agony drunk
I sit here drunk now. I am a series of small victories and large defeats and I am as amazed as any other that I have gotten from there to here without committing murder or being murdered; without having ended up in the madhouse. as I drink alone again tonight my soul despite all the past agony thanks all the gods who were not there for me then.
father luck would-be
Bad luck for the young poet would be a rich father, an early marriage, an early success or the ability to do anything well.
pain miracle should
life itself is not the miracle. that pain should be so constant, that's the miracle -
museums
We are all museums of fear.
stupid hard-work mad
Most of the world was mad. And the part that wasn't mad was angry. And the part that wasn't mad or angry was just stupid. I had no chance. I had no choice. Just hang on and wait for the end. It was hard work. It was the hardest work imaginable.
loser winner
In a capitalistic society the losers slaved for the winners and you have to have more losers than winners.
hair water faces
I went to the bathroom and threw some water on my face, combed my hair. If I could only comb that face, I thought, but I can't.