Charles Bukowski

The bookstore clerk was a good enough sort, trying to be a writer. His name was Randy Evans but he was too far into Kafka to accomplish any kind of literary clarity.

"Potential," I said, "doesn't mean a thing. You've got to do it. Almost every baby in a crib has more potential than I have."

How I'd like to get in bed with her, I thought. But there was no way. Yet, somebody was going to bed with her regularly.

“I had a dream about you. I opened your chest like a cabinet, it had doors, and when I opened the doors I saw all kinds of soft things inside you—teddy bears, tiny fuzzy animals, all these soft, cuddly things. Then I had a dream about this other man. He walked up to me and handed me some pieces of paper. He was a writer. I took the pieces of paper and looked at them. And the pieces of paper had cancer. His writing had cancer.

each person is only given so many

evenings

and each wasted evening is

a gross violation against the

natural course of

your only

life

it has taken me

decades

but I have finally found out

how to say

“no.”

it

takes

a lot of

desperation

dissatisfaction

and

disillusion

to

write

a

few

good

poems.

it’s not

for

everybody

it’s all right to be a starving writer

but not

a starving writer who

drinks.

drunks are never forgiven

anything.

my cat looks at me and is not sure what I am and

I look back and am pleased to feel

the same

about him…

not writing is not good

but trying to write

when you can’t is

worse.