Run With the Hunted: A Charles Bukowski Reader

by Charles Bukowski

  “I don’t want to fuck you over, Dee Dee,” I said. “I’m not always good to women.”

  “I told you I love you.”

  “Don’t do it. Don’t love me.”

  “All right,” she said, “I won’t love you, I’ll almost love you. Will that be all right?”

  “It’s much better than the other.”

  We finished our wine and went to bed....

  —WOMEN

  I’m in love

  she’s young, she said,

  but look at me,

  I have pretty ankles,

  and look at my wrists, I have pretty

  wrists

  o my god,

  I thought it was all working,

  and now it’s her again,

  every time she phones you go crazy,

  you told me it was over

  you told me it was finished,

  listen, I’ve lived long enough to become a

  good woman,

  why do you need a bad woman?

  you need to be tortured, don’t you?

  you think life is rotten if somebody treats you

  rotten it all fits,

  doesn’t it?

  tell me, is that it? do you want to be treated like a

  piece of shit?

  and my son, my son was going to meet you.

  I told my son

  and I dropped all my lovers.

  I stood up in a cafe and screamed

  I’M IN LOVE,

  and now you’ve made a fool of me …

  I’m sorry, I said, I’m really sorry.

  hold me, she said, will you please hold me?

  I’ve never been in one of these things before, I said,

  these triangles …

  she got up and lit a cigarette, she was trembling all

  over. she paced up and down, wild and crazy, she had

  a small body. her arms were thin, very thin and when

  she screamed and started beating me I held her

  wrists and then I got it through the eyes: hatred,

  centuries deep and true. I was wrong and graceless and

  sick. all the things I had learned had been wasted.

  there was no living creature as foul as I

  and all my poems were

  false.

  White Dog Hunch

  Henry took the pillow and bunched it behind his back and waited. Louise came in with toast, marmalade and coffee. The toast was buttered.

  “Are you sure you don’t want a couple of soft-boiled eggs?” she asked.

  “No, it’s O.K. This is fine.”

  “You should have a couple of eggs.”

  “All right, then.”

  Louise left the bedroom. He’d been up earlier to go to the bathroom and noticed his clothes had been hung up. Something Lita would never do. And Louise was an excellent fuck. No children. He loved the way she did things, softly, carefully. Lita was always on the attack—all hard edges. When Louise came back with the eggs he asked her, “What was it?”

  “What was what?”

  “You even peeled the eggs. I mean, why did your husband divorce you?”

  “Oh, wait,” she said, “the coffee is boiling!” and she ran from the room.

  He could listen to classical music with her. She played the piano. She had books: The Savage God by Alvarez; The Life of Picasso; E. B. White; e. e. cummings; T. S. Eliot; Pound; Ibsen, and on and on. She even had nine of his own books. Maybe that was the best part.

  Louise returned and got into bed, put her plate on her lap. “What went wrong with your marriage?”

  “Which one? There’ve been five!”

  “The last. Lita.”

  “Oh. Well, unless Lita was in motion she didn’t think anything was happening. She liked dancing and parties, her whole life revolved around dancing and parties. She liked what she called ‘getting high.’ That meant men. She claimed I restricted her ‘highs.’ She said I was jealous.”

  “Did you restrict her?”

  “I suppose so, but I tried not to. During the last party I went into the backyard with my beer and let her carry on. There was a houseful of men, I could hear her in there squealing, ‘Yeehooo! Yee Hoo! Yee Hoo!’ I suppose she was just a natural country girl.”

  “You could have danced too.”

  “I suppose so. Sometimes I did. But they turn the stereo up so high that you can’t think. I went out into the yard. I went back for some beer and there was a guy kissing her under the stairway. I walked out until they were finished, then went back again for the beer. It was dark but I thought it had been a friend and later I asked him what he was doing under the stairway there.”

  “Did she love you?”

  “She said she did.”

  “You know, kissing and dancing isn’t so bad.”

  “I suppose not. But you’d have to see her. She had a way of dancing as if she were offering herself as a sacrifice. For rape. It was very effective. The men loved it. She was 33 years old with two children.”

  “She didn’t realize you were a solitary. Men have different natures.”

  “She never considered my nature. Like I say, unless she was in motion, or turning on, she didn’t think anything was happening. Otherwise she was bored. ‘Oh, this bores me or that bores me. Eating breakfast with you bores me. Watching you write bores me. I need challenges.’”

  “That doesn’t seem completely wrong.”

  “I suppose not. But you know, only boring people get bored. They have to prod themselves continually in order to feel alive.”

  “Like your drinking, for instance?”

  “Yes, like my drinking. I can’t face life straight on either.”

  “Was that all there was to the problem?”

  “No, she was a nymphomaniac but didn’t know it. She claimed I satisfied her sexually but I doubt if I satisfied her spiritual nymphomania. She was the second nymph I had lived with. She had fine qualities aside from that, but her nymphomania was embarrassing. Both to me and to my friends. They’d take me aside and say, ‘What the hell’s the matter with her?’ And I’d say, ‘Nothing, she’s just a country girl.’”

  “Was she?”

  “Yes. But the other part was embarrassing.”

  “More toast?”

  “No, this is fine.”

  “What was embarrassing?”

  “Her behavior. If there was another man in the room she’d sit as close to him as possible. He would duck down to put out a cigarette in an ashtray on the floor, she’d duck down too. Then he’d turn his head to look at something and she’d do the same thing.”

  “Was it a coincidence?”

  “I used to think so. But it happened too often. The man would get up to walk across the room and she’d get up and walk right alongside of him. Then when he walked back across the room she’d follow right by his side. The incidents were continuous and numerous, and like I say, embarrassing to both me and my friends. And yet I’m sure she didn’t know what she was doing, it all came from the subconscious.”

  “When I was a girl there was a woman in the neighborhood with this 15-year-old daughter. The daughter was uncontrollable. The mother would send her out for a loaf of bread and she’d come back eight hours later with the bread but meanwhile she would have fucked six men.”

  “I guess the mother should have baked her own bread.”

  “I suppose so. The girl couldn’t help herself. Whenever she saw a man she’d start to jiggle all over. The mother finally had her spayed.”

  “Can they do that?”

  “Yes, but you have to go through all lands of legal procedures. There was nothing else to do with her. She’d have been pregnant all her life.

  “Do you have anything against dancing?” Louise continued.

  “Most people dance for joy, out of good feeling. She crossed over into dirty areas. One of her favorite dances was The White Dog Hunch. A guy would wrap both his legs around her leg and hump her like a male dog in heat. Another of
her favorites was The Drunk Dance. She and her partner would end up on the floor rolling over on top of each other.”

  “She said you were jealous of her dancing?”

  “That was the word she used most often: jealous.”

  “I used to dance in high school.”

  “Yeah? Listen, thanks for breakfast.”

  “It’s all right. I had a partner in high school. We were the best dancers in school. He had three balls; I thought it was a sign of masculinity.”

  “Three balls?”

  “Yes, three balls. Anyhow, we really knew how to dance. I’d signal by touching him on the wrist, then we’d both leap and turn in the air, very high, and land on our feet. One time we were dancing, I touched his wrist and I made my leap and turn, but I didn’t land on my feet. I landed on my ass. He put his hand over his mouth and stared down at me and said, ‘Oh, good heavens!’ and he walked off. He didn’t pick me up. He was a homosexual. We never danced again.”

  “Do you have something against three-balled homosexuals?”

  “No, but we never danced again.”

  “Lita, she was really dance-obsessed. She’d go into strange bars and ask men to dance with her. Of course, they would. They thought she was an easy fuck. I don’t know if she did or didn’t. I suppose that sometimes she did. The trouble with men who dance or hang out in bars is that their perception is on a parallel with the tape worm.”

  “How did you know that?”

  “They’re caught in the ritual.”

  “What ritual?”

  “The ritual of misdirected energy.”

  Henry got up and began to dress. “Kid, I got to get going.”

  “What is it?”

  “I just have to get some work done. I’m supposed to be a writer.”

  “There’s a play by Ibsen on tv tonight. 8:30. Will you come over?”

  “Sure. I left that pint of scotch. Don’t drink it all.”

  Henry got into his clothes and went down the stairway and got into his car and drove to his place and his typewriter. Second floor rear. Every day as he typed, the woman downstairs would beat on her ceiling with the broom. He wrote the hard way, it had always been the hard way: The White Dog Hunch …

  Louise phoned at 5:30 p.m. She’d been at the scotch. She was drunk. She slurred her words. She rambled. The reader of Thomas Chatterton and D. H. Lawrence. The reader of nine of his books.

  “Henry?”

  “Yes?”

  “Oh, something marvelous has happened!”

  “Yes?”

  “This black boy came to see me. He’s beautiful! He’s more beautiful than you …”

  “Of course.”

  “… more beautiful than you and I.”

  “Yes.”

  “He got me so excited! I’m about to go out of my mind!”

  “Yes.”

  “You don’t mind?”

  “No.”

  “You know how we spent the afternoon?”

  “No.”

  “Reading your poems!”

  “Oh?”

  “And you know what he said?”

  “No.”

  “He said your poems were great!”

  “That’s O.K.”

  “Listen, he got me so excited. I don’t know how to handle it. Won’t you come over? Now? I want to see you now …”

  “Louise, I’m working …”

  “Listen, you don’t have anything against black men?”

  “No.”

  “I’ve known this boy for ten years. He used to work for me when I was rich.”

  “You mean when you were still with your rich husband.”

  “Will I see you later? Ibsen is on at 8:30.”

  “I’ll let you know.”

  “Why did that bastard come around? I was all right and then he came around. Christ. I’m so excited, I’ve got to see you. I’m about to go crazy. He was so beautiful.”

  “I’m working, Louise. The word around here is ‘Rent.’ Try to understand.”

  Louise hung up. She called again at 8:20 about Ibsen. Henry said he was still working. He was. Then he began to drink and just sat in a chair, he just sat in a chair. At 9:50 there was a knock on the door. It was Booboo Meltzer, the number one rock star of 1970, currently unemployed, still living off royalties. “Hello, kid,” said Henry.

  Meltzer walked in and sat down.

  “Man,” he said, “you’re a beautiful old cat. I can’t get over you.”

  “Lay off, kid, cats are out of style, dogs are in now.”

  “I got a hunch you need help, old man.”

  “Kid, it’s never been different.”

  Henry walked into the kitchen, found two beers, cracked them and walked out.

  “I’m out of cunt, kid, which to me is like being out of love. I can’t separate them. I’m not that clever.”

  “None of us are clever, Pops. We all need help.”

  “Yeh.”

  Meltzer had a small celluloid tube. Carefully he tapped out two little white spots on the coffee table.

  “This is cocaine, Pops, cocaine …”

  “Ah, hah.”

  Meltzer reached into his pocket, pulled out a $50 bill, rolled the fifty tightly, then worked it up one nostril. Pressing a finger on the other nostril he bent over one of the white spots on the coffee table and inhaled it. Then he took the $50 bill, worked it up the other nostril and sniffed the second white spot.

  “Snow,” said Meltzer.

  “It’s Christmas. Appropriate,” said Henry.

  Meltzer tapped out two more white spots and passed the fifty. Henry said, “Hold it, I’ll use my own,” and he found a one dollar bill and sniffed up. Once for each nostril.

  “What do you think of The White Dog Hunch?” asked Henry.

  “This is ‘The White Dog Hunch,’” said Meltzer, tapping out two more spots.

  “God,” said Henry, “I don’t think I’ll ever be bored again. You’re not bored with me, are you?”

  “No way,” said Meltzer, sniffing it up through the fifty with all his might. “Pops, there’s just no way …”

  —HOT WATER MUSIC

  Sandra

  is the slim tall

  ear-ringed

  bedroom damsel

  dressed in a long

  gown

  she’s always high

  in heels

  spirit

  pills

  booze

  Sandra leans out of

  her chair

  leans toward

  Glendale

  I wait for her head

  to hit the closet

  doorknob

  as she attempts to

  light

  a new cigarette on an

  almost burnt-out

  one

  at 32 she likes

  young neat

  unscratched boys

  with faces like the bottoms

  of new saucers

  she has proclaimed as much

  to me

  has brought her prizes

  over for me to view:

  silent blonde zeros of young

  flesh

  who

  a) sit

  b) stand

  c) talk

  at her command

  sometimes she brings one

  sometimes two

  sometimes three

  for me to

  view

  Sandra looks very good in

  long gowns

  Sandra could probably break

  a man’s heart

  I hope she finds

  one.

  I began receiving letters from a girl in New York City. Her name was Mindy. She had run across a couple of my books, but the best thing about her letters was that she seldom mentioned writing except to say that she was not a writer. She wrote about things in general and men and sex in particular. Mindy was 25, wrote in longhand, and the handwriting was stable, sensible, yet humorous. I answered her letters and was
always glad to find one of hers in my mailbox. Most people are much better at saying things in letters than in conversation, and some people can write artistic, inventive letters, but when they try a poem or story or novel they become pretentious.

  Then Mindy sent some photographs. If they were faithful she was quite beautiful. We wrote for several more weeks and then she mentioned that she had a two week vacation coming up.

  Why don’t you fly out? I suggested.

  All right, she replied.

  We began to phone one another. Finally she gave me her arrival date at L.A. International.

  I’ll be there, I told her, nothing will stop me.

  I sat in the airport and waited. You never knew about photos. You could never tell. I was nervous. I felt like vomiting. I lit a cigarette and gagged. Why did I do these things? I didn’t want her now. And Mindy was flying all the way from New York City. I knew plenty of women. Why always more women? What was I trying to do? New affairs were exciting but they were also hard work. The first kiss, the first fuck had some drama. People were interesting at first. Then later, slowly but surely, all the flaws and madness would manifest themselves. I would become less and less to them; they would mean less and less to me.

  I was old and I was ugly. Maybe that’s why it felt so good to stick it into young girls. I was King Kong and they were lithe and tender. Was I trying to screw my way past death? By being with young girls did I hope I wouldn’t grow old, feel old? I just didn’t want to age badly, simply quit, be dead before death itself arrived.

  Mindy’s plane landed and taxied in. I felt I was in danger. Women knew me beforehand because they had read my books. I had exposed myself. On the other hand, I knew nothing of them. I was the real gambler. I could get killed, I could get my balls cut off. Chinaski without balls. Love Poems of a Eunuch.

  I stood waiting for Mindy. The passengers came out of the gate.

  Oh, I hope she’s not the one.

  Or her.

  Or especially her.

  Now that one would be fine! Look at those legs, that behind, those eyes....

  One of them moved towards me. I hoped it was her. She was the best of the whole damned lot. I couldn’t be that lucky. She walked up to me and smiled. “I’m Mindy.”

  “I’m glad you’re Mindy.”