there is this feeling as i try and process the latest collection of bukowski poems of heart rending sorrow that one day the ever slimming pile of (un)released poetry will be the last

anguish

it feels like he typed each on my aorta

tangled my consciousness in the simplicity of words flowing in that broken cadence

i read a few like snatching a chocolate from a heart shaped box

self control is a real son of a bitch

but soon enough my greedy finger will just rattle the discarded papers

then what do you do

save the box that once gave only pleasure but now echos heartache like a transistor radio through that ine tinny speaker that never fully comes to tune

it just hisses occasionally like one of those giant cockroaches

one more for the road

and another in hopes it washes the grime from the last away

until all that is left is the sour taste of last night’s red wine while your fingers are still greasy from the chicken

they linger in the back of your mind like the cheap perfume that has soaked its way into the threadbare pillow cases from what’s her name with hairy mole on her chin

the one that tickled when she kissed you

distracting

a dead man whispering from some distant moment in the past with words of warning that the cyclical nature of self destruction is best traveled alone with a large audience

and i listen

trying to crack the code in those meanderings lines that seem effortless in the seamless nonsense of it all

a parody of paradox that syphons the undercurrent with a crackling pulse

yet viewed through a telescope on a tugboat far from shore in one of those dead current zones on a windless day in pantomime

and all i want is to be the next him

the next hank

i choose to ignore the audacity of it with an upturned nose.

i can hear him whisper as debussy plays

and why the fuck not?

why the fuck not?