Beerspit Night and Cursing

by Charles Bukowski

  So far—you are all that LIVES in this land// Maj was alive—but the coloured folk want immediate results—they do not know that it even took Ez a whole life time—I cant make anybody rich ’n famous in a year// you have lasted…Wang has sold his arsehole for a position—Ernie goes off the main line & gets into the gotttamtist bypaths—but you Wobbling One have remained Constant/// I guess the Kaiser is fiercer than the Rabbi or the Medicine Man—but here YOU…La Druidessa hath kept pace…& there are those days not worth a nickel…

  Tell yr “she” that yes the moon has an effect upon the watery parts of our brain but I do not think it controls the MIND unless it is chained to earth…Dante teaches “get past the sphere of Fortuna (MOON) to be free of Chance” Fate or whatever/// yr “he” is an ice cold turd & I would have shit one quietly & shoved it in his mackeral snapper if he answered my questions like that the narsty bitch

  you are a cruel bastard bukowski but you are not a coward/// the rest are cruel AND cowardly…all but Ernie// Jory don’t matter—nor Wang—they are merely “contemporaries” & Ez sez: “ya kin forget about yr contemporaries”…but last night I thought that by remaining out in my private cloud world—that I was letting you all alone with the UNamericans who do not know how to write in english & are not really what they got born because they WANT so ambitiously to write in english but hear now Buk—the BEST never pay any attention to them—so actually they aint much threat—damm it all—if only the river wd part & let me see a clear path instead of trying to make each decision on my own—Gib cant help because his values aint mine

  Yes—Agenda goes off but at least I can work with Cookson—do a cover for Agenda/// and who gets inside that I dig is Rev. Swabey who is a serious man// don’t know what he’d think of Satis…maybe we shd INFILTRATE like Der Tong did—now maybe that is the way—but O! Lawd! Shall it be said of the Wilde Goose that she took off the way th’ Old Blawck Vulchurss Ventttddttt???? oye Ma’ Mia…it’s ’nuff to make a Zaint vrummm hebben smoker der veewdttttt

  now I go—it is so grey in here being only 10/10 a.m. dot I kin hardtttly zee…& thank you for Satis & I will ponder this new problem…

  love

  Shed//

  Sheri

  LISTEN AT THAT HEALTH STORE GET A COPY OF PREVENTION MAGAZINE FOR 35¢…a dec. copy & turn to p. 35 & you send for the vitamins yrself Buk/ costs 25¢ & then about $5. month for ALL NATURAL VITAMINS plus info. on them—so do it…I just thought that they wdn’t let me send them to you & I already got some for my inlaws & my parents & I’ll pay the $5. m.o. for them but wdn’t let me send for [illegible]

  note: it is so fkn coldttt in this unheated hotel in this cold chill rain that I just got up & fished out Gib’s old army underdrawers midtt long laigs & put them on…I got on a sweater// a jumper of wool// my wool socks & my snow boots & now the long army wool drawers…look like a floradora goirl with the skirt up & a bear with the skirt down…

  I mean about those vitamins// they send you a full months supply of NATURAL…that means no coal tar nor other chemicals…vitamins for 25¢ trial of 100—then they mail you yr supply for 25¢ cheaper until you no longer want them & I got some for my parents who cannot be educated any more than YOU—but I little pill at least the dopes WILL take so I’ll send them their 100 pills which just got here this a.m. & mail back the card saying yes I’ll send the $2.25 every 2 weeks or so—& I just realised that you’d be getting the card & you’d be salty maybe if I stuck you for $2.25 each 2 wks….but you simple lookin’ s.o.b. & double distilled bastid THEY WILL BE A FOOD SUPPLIMENT TO yr green beer—I hardly eat anything now that I use the food suppliments—anyhow got no time for it am that busy—just eat bare minimum// So get a copy of Prevention & send 25¢ to these people// don’t be a juice square buk//

  now must go—oh mah knees are finally warm—this is the first time I ever wore pants in mah life! It is that cold in this joint…alls I got for heat is my little hot plate for making 2—to heat 2 rooms—oh give me the artist life…the gay romantic artist life…with a heart that’s free as the open sea & an ass that’s coldttt as th’ skies…so long buk—ah is coldttttt as a frozen turd…

  Sheri

  L.A. cold Dec. [10] 1961

  Shed, girl-woman:

  D.R. Wang has written one good poem that I know of. (Quicksilver, Summer 1960). To wit, and with the usual senseless dedication:

  Postscript

  (to Max Finstein)

  All night long

  a mosquito

  zanzanzara

  zips and unzips

  my nerves.

  Should I kill

  kamikaze

  slap dash

  ouch goes

  my soul.

  now this is not a bad poem, really. And so let’s give DEDICATION DAVID a bow, and then let him go.

  I work better alone, Princess; let’s not join hands.

  Rec. your enclosures and have mailed them on to Corrington.

  You better keep on my good side, baby, if you want any more drawings for any more future…whatever the long name of your thing is.

  Your Ernie will blast me from witchhazel to Sutter’s Creek but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

  I will run over to 4207 W. 3rd. eventually and see what’s cooking or wats not sprayed. Will give you a fullsome picture of the proprietor and all the helty handsome rats.

  Yes, you’re right. Major wants so badly to be famous he won’t take time to wipe his ass. This need prob. springs partly out of the colored thing, and it’s too bad.

  There is a person who wants my friendship and he dribbles his soul upon me at every opp. It is a slimey sickening mess, but since we spring from similar environments,

  by learning what he wants

  I learn what to leave alone

  because I know that he is dead

  by the pale shell color of his eyes.

  Yes, you are right. I am cruel. It cuts away a lot of mess. Cruelty is usually the tool of the masses. I have learned to use this tool to gain time and solitude, 2 important factors for anybody bit with the creator-bug.

  This is a bad letter and it is a bad afternoon and I am sitting here drinking beer and smoking Salems and the menthol is too much, and the old woman has phoned and I have said no, no, I can’t see you I will bring your coat and shoes over to you, it is a bad day, I do not feel good.

  Ok, she says, I know how you get.

  They god damned better know because when I don’t want to be fucked with I don’t want to be fucked with.

  I am sorry I could not understand the Mancho on your letters; prob. hog-color cuss wurds by the Princess, but looked nize.

  All last night I kept hearing this sound, it was like the clicking of steel marbles every 30 seconds or like the axeman swiping off a head and I thought

  what the hell

  oh what the merry hell now????

  because I don’t sleep good anyhow

  and so I laid there awake all night. if there hadda been a big woman cow

  I coulda put my cold feet on the backs of her calves,

  and I got up in the morning looking more Buk than ever (which is bad)

  and found the sink was dripping onto a piece of wax paper,

  and so today am in no mood for writing letters.

  Don’t know if I told you. Satis going to run me a free ad on Longshots. Also a couple of my poems in the Spring 1962 issue. Editor suggested another outfit for me in England but I don’t have any more poems right now. They operate out of a basement, which I like. Good things can come from a basement that cannot come from any where else. There is something holy in poverty that makes you strong—if you know how to handle it. If you don’t know how to handle it you might as well be rich because whatever god there is is wasting his benefits on you.

  And now that I have poisoned your air, I’m leaving.

  love, frum

  krautpollock

  Bukowski

  burning earth farmer burning field

  air messag
e;

  p.79 H.D. “yet the ancient rubrics reveal that

  we are back at the beginning:”

  “enigmas, rubrics promise as before

  protection for the scribe;

  he takes precedence of the priest,

  stands second only to the Pharaoh.”

  thou’rt a scribe

  i am one—“second only to the Pharaoh”

  and the Pharaoh is coming; I am waiting now for the Pharaoh; read The Flowering of the Rod about the wild geese & what

  the world is

  read The Helmsman “we have always known you wanted us” what better prayer?

  I never read poetry unless i reach the mind state of intense agony where i have no way to turn & i am helpless…either without money or wheels or friends or even po li…in agony & helpless then i turn to the record & i only can read those words that are like balm on my writhing brains…they cool me & heal me & then i know why the agony came down on me…to force me to KNOW & it was no different with H.D. or ezra…

  now to yr 2 lets: when say kicked me out of nest am using image—it was a nest in st. liz…warm & cozy & am now on own…poor birdie hardly knew how to fly when scorpion tossed eternal light to her & cut out for italy/ re: theories of painting clip/ there is never more than one or 2 great artists of any period…the rest is theory; the art that remains is the art that dealt with the hidden realities of the age; its eternal beauty/ i am the only painter that will matter because one of my works has the power to change what surrounds it & not to be changed—w[yndham]. lewis is our greatest ‘social’ painter; gautier our sculptor; and the Hawk is the painter…not interested in slopin’ up the world with art…but to plant seeds…& harvest in the few churrrrr

  observe that Pascin cannot draw hands or feet

  nor breasts…but only can make a picture of it; that is not eternal art

  that is the monkey doing flesh pictures charrrrrrrRRRRRRRRming and dated/ his yiddish girls are without great spirit & depressed & all cunt which is not the real love hole; it goes into the mind which aint the brain but being in the mind it convulses the brain & that in turn twitches the cunt or rooster stick/ but it begins in the mind…even the hollywood jews who letch & lust & got gold to pay…it starts in their mind…a love of beauty that is so tied in with their genius for decaying…that it wd lust the purity out of love…but nevertheless the process is the same as sacred love/ Pascin an interesting Jew with a Yen for Beauty; that is no goddess he gives us but an earth worm’s view of a hunk of beefsteak in good prime & a swell smell when cookin’

  doz all/ the zen joke is another yiddish comment to dumb xtian tits in bed; north beach full of xtian tits or painted faces who wd grab ANY stage to emote upon…even the snarl; fuck & drop one…yes ernie CAN write buk/ he has that good yiddish clarity of mind; he wont give us poetry duckder but he will give us an INSIGHT into literature & after all the degree that ernie is going to have to teach has got to have the insight brought before them; they are too buried under age-old hate for poetry…ernie is a Jew who has no hate in him…only grief…

  the remainder of this letter seems to be in a forgotten language resembling english but not being it so turning to other let/

  h.d. not “proper” or “formal”—she is more economical but still us…magic deciphers key stones information valuables—world of american art not same as w. of europ. art; h.d.’s audience in europe/ ours is here & some times i write for them too when i have impulse/ they know more at a certain degree so i can say less & mean more—way h.d. does; human pain is so old that it aint news in europe; yes yew iz a german pollack ah lived in them neighborhoods as kid; very familiar face…kind & good people & loving…

  go read on tape buk you coward; these kids need some road to follow wild geese leader…that is a way…try to give them some respectability…but insist on yr own terms…make ’em come to you…it is safety from the mob it is ‘respectability’ it is putting the power in yr hands to help another scribe in pain; do not be so selfish—it is not you—it is truth we are keeping alive/ & when one comes burning with truth…is beer ALL you’ll be able to give?? com’n you big dumb pollack…go make those bastards with their wires & holes & tapes & horseshit etc…make ’em W O R K FOR US who are out of egypt & return to it…or i will kick yr ass when i get you back inside that tomb you dumb dickhead; stop POSING AS AN AWTIZ & GO TO WORK SHITHEAD take anything…snatch anything…but make yr own terms…and do not go there or let them come unless you can be yrself…no matter vottddddd kidttt…it is a POSE to deny any poet…you or any other…a place in the sun; after my work on earth be done…there will be a wee hope for the female of our kind…black white pink gold grey or yalllerrr…because i will take anything i can to help…i wd shit in public if they’d pay me for it & then give money to little beverly to write her purple passions out…i wd crawl on my belly like a cur…if i knew a pair of boots that wd feed crumbs to my little chickens…

  there is life & there is art & it is our job to bring them together with setting the joint on fire…or drownin’ it in come…gib is an inert creature…that snatched a jet-propelled squid…quivering with life & that sends out a black ink screen when under attack/ gib’s inert…his super self that sees all & knows all wdn’t move if you cracked down the world on it; he wont move & he aint ever gonna…it is the quivering squid shed that gets us out of places & into new places…and changes every spot we get to…gib wont move for shit man & he wont fight or do anything else & he only works in order to escape from me for enough time to recover from the shock of the quivering intensity; his job is his sanity…well i am forced to use my mind for fighting & that wont hurt it…gib wont fight with mind or body…

  am mailin’ you herb co book where get frankenscense/ will mail you some got from east coast co but believe will be same; now must go—eat lunch in car with gib/ will drop jory a note but not right now—i want to be free to stop all the worldliness & be invisible again; then can see jory & co…when house is not full of paper & work & stuff…

  this hotel reading room…will encl clip very interest. clip’d in 1956…only this yr this room got any time to read as nothin’ else to do…5 yrs haulin’ stuff around…now i cry for freedom…will finish work & be gypsy again…

  ezra has my la martinelli soul in castle in italy—now let gypsy be free…the daughter of the pharaoh…La Farona…if i ever get to you i will make draw. then don’t need any fotos…you are a serious man now & not any more little boy; be as you are…we all mourn the first freshness but now if we are aware that the mummy is fast rotting & freeing us from this love task…if yew skin badtt yew mummy parchment is going to dust…no matter…you still second only to the pharaoh.

  now go read on to tape & use those ruddy buggers…i go eat sandwiches & tea & mail out yo wocks this week & send you love…

  & be good…

  fo yo mamma

  Sheri

  Los Angeles, Calif. April 22, 1961

  Sister in the Dust:

  I cannot read and I will not read for their little dirty skins; I will not go on tape; I will not stand before a mike and spiel something into it that I have long ago written and forgotten; I will not be their dupe and their dummy; I will not have their handshake, or their women or their wine or their brotherhood. I stand alone and apart from the artists and the scribblers—I will have none of them. Every touch of them is death. I fear them not because I am weak but because I am strong. I am a simple person.

  You have no idea how your “innocent” Jory, the Riverboat Jordan Kid, hung me from the cross by the balls. Dragging editors, writers, in upon me. Or me upon them.—“Oh, come on, come on with me! I have an appointment with this guy! I don’t want to go. But it’s 6:30 now and I was supposed to be there at 5:30. But he’s treated me nicely. And I’ve got to go and I want you to come with me.”

  “Jory, I’d rather not.”

  “Oh, come on, Jesus Christ, man! Just this once…” and etc.

  And so I weakened and went, and lea
rned.

  Or the next night on the phone: “I’m over at a little gathering at X, the painter’s place. You’ve heard of him? You haven’t? Well, anyhow, it’s just a small group of people, some drinks and some talk…”

  This, of course, I threw out the window like a tarantula upon my worst enemy.

  Drinks and talk, all of them rubbing together, telling each other that they are great, and later, like a bunch of over-the-fence neighborhood bitches, cutting each other down…Princess, or whoteverthehell you are, I have tested myself. Once in college I deliberately forced myself into the hell of a poetry class, and it was here that I learned what I already knew—that poetry was the most pretensive of all the Arts and dragged in the most slipshod practitioners out of the morass. I learned plenty but I would have learned more shooting down rooks.

  I cannot speak on tape for a petty bunch of word-mongers who would really rather be fucked and praised than shape the word. It is not proper to bring in personal experience, but when you have crawled across the cold cement floor of a charity hospital with the blood spewing in great sick showers from your mouth and your ass, and nobody to answer. The doors closed, doors a foot thick so the nurses can’t hear the screams of those too poor to die nicely. And all the old men looking at me, white-haired sticks the ravens had picked dry. And finally an hour later—a nurse. “Oh, you’ve hemorrhaged again! Oh dear, I can’t pick you up.” She could have, there was nothing left but bone and skin. And 2 of them came and sat me in a chair and they slid the chair across the floor to my bed and flicked me in, like red wet garbage.

  And then the head nurse came: “You need some transfusions, but you’ll either have to pay for them or have blood-credit, someplace you have donated blood, or we can’t give you any.”