The Genius of The Crowd

[Froderik]

there is enough treachery, hatred, violence, absurdity in the average
human being to supply any given army on any given day

and the best at murder are those who preach against it
and the best at hate are those who preach love
and the best at war finally are those who preach peace

those who preach god
need god
those who preach peace
do not have peace
those who preach love
do not have love
beware the preachers
beware the knowers

beware
those who
are always
reading
books

beware those who either detest
poverty or are proud of it

beware those quick to praise
for they need praise in return

beware those who are quick to censure
they are afraid of what they do not know

beware those who seek constant crowds
they are nothing alone

beware
the average man
the average woman
beware their love

their love is average
seeks average
but there is genius in their hatred
there is enough genius in their hatred to kill you
to kill anybody
not wanting solitude
not understanding solitude
they will attempt to destroy
anything
that differs
from their own

not being able
to create art
they will not
understand art

they will consider their failure
as creators
only as a failure
of the world

not being able to love fully
they will believe your love
incomplete
and then they will hate you

and their hatred will be perfect
like a shining diamond
like a knife
like a mountain
like a tiger
like hemlock

their finest
art

--Charles Bukowski

[Samara]

Charles Bukowski. I was at a friend's house several years ago who had some of his books and I devoured him.  (Not the friend, the author's books.) It was sort of compelling but depressing. I stepped away from the books feeling... perturbed. Can't read another Bukowski.  I don't mind feeling unsettled after reading disturbing works, but at the end of the day, doesn't he just write about lonely, supremely selfish drunks?  

When I read the poem, there is some part of me that recognizes the truth in its cynicism. And another part that rejects it in the perpetual hope of a Julie Andrews sing-along.

[justonemore]

There was this guy, (Suetonius, I think, but hell, i'm a redneck, and I think everything's Suetonius) Any way this guy said" If you want peace, prepare for war."
That's why the 'parabellum round is named as it is.
Just sayin'
J.O.M.

[Froderik]

this fear of being what they are:
dead.

at least they are not out on the street, they
are careful to stay indoors, those
pasty mad who sit alone before their TV sets,
their lives full of canned, mutilated laughter.

their ideal neighborhood
of parked cars
of little green lawns
of little homes
the little doors that open and close
as their relatives visit
throughout the holidays
the doors closing
behind the dying who die so slowly
behind the dead who are still alive
in your quiet average neighborhood
of winding streets
of agony
of confusion
of horror
of fear
of ignorance.

a dog standing behind a fence.

a man silent at the window.

[Froderik]

you have to have it or the walls will close
in.
you have to give everything up, throw it
away, everything away.
you have to look at what you look at
or think what you think
or do what you do
or
don't do
without considering personal
advantage
without accepting guidance.

people are worn away with
striving,
they hide in common
habits.
their concerns are herd
concerns.

few have the ability to stare
at an old shoe for
ten minutes
or to think of odd things
like who invented the
doorknob?

they become unalive
because they are unable to
pause
undo themselves
unkink
unsee
unlearn
roll clear.
listen to their untrue
laughter, then
walk
away.

[Froderik]

born like this
into this
as the chalk faces smile
as Mrs. Death laughs
as the elevators break
as political landscapes dissolve
as the supermarket bag boy holds a college degree
as the oily fish spit out their oily prey
as the sun is masked

we are
born like this
into this
into these carefully mad wars
into the sight of broken factory windows of emptiness
into bars where people no longer speak to each other
into fist fights that end as shootings and knifings

born into this
into hospitals which are so expensive that it's cheaper to die
into lawyers who charge so much it's cheaper to plead guilty
into a country where the jails are full and the madhouses closed
into a place where the masses elevate fools into rich heroes

born into this
walking and living through this
dying because of this
muted because of this
castrated
debauched
disinherited
because of this
fooled by this
used by this
pissed on by this
made crazy and sick by this
made violent
made inhuman
by this

the heart is blackened
the fingers reach for the throat
the gun
the knife
the bomb
the fingers reach toward an unresponsive god

the fingers reach for the bottle
the pill
the powder

we are born into this sorrowful deadliness
we are born into a government 60 years in debt
that soon will be unable to even pay the interest on that debt
and the banks will burn
money will be useless
there will be open and unpunished murder in the streets
it will be guns and roving mobs
land will be useless
food will become a diminishing return
nuclear power will be taken over by the many
explosions will continually shake the earth
radiated robot men will stalk each other
the rich and the chosen will watch from space platforms
Dante's inferno will be made to look like a children's playground

the sun will not be seen and it will always be night
trees will die
all vegetation will die
radiated men will eat the flesh of radiated men
the sea will be poisoned
the lakes and rivers will vanish
rain will be the new gold

the rotting bodies of men and animals will stink in the dark wind

the last few survivors will be overtaken by new and hideous diseases
and the space platforms will be destroyed by attrition
the petering out of supplies
the natural effect of general decay

and there will be the most beautiful silence never heard

born out of that.

the sun still hidden there

awaiting the next chapter.

[Samara]

Good poem.

Remind me not to read it if I'm ever suicidal.

Why can't I be comfortable with Darkness?

[DannyB II]

Good poem.

Remind me not to read it if I'm ever suicidal.

Why can't I be comfortable with Darkness?

Because I don't think there is such thing as comfortable. I think it is called excepting. I except the darkness, it is there. What I do with this is up to me.

[Froderik]

is much admired by Man
because he believes in
the hand which feeds
him. a
perfect
set-up. for
13 cents a
day you've got
a hired killer
who thinks
you are
God. a
dog can't tell a Nazi from a
Republican from a Commie from
a Democrat. and, many times,
neither can I.

[Froderik]

with old cars, especially when you buy them second-
hand and drive them for many years
a love affair is inevitable:
you even learn to
accept their little
eccentricities:
the leaking water pump
the failing plugs
the rusted throttle arm
the reluctant carburetor
the oily engine
the dead clock
the frozen speedometer and
other sundry
defects.
you also learn all the tricks to
keep the love affair alive:
how to slam the glove compartment so that
it will stay closed,
how to slap the headlight with an open palm
in order to have
light,
how many times to pump the gas pedal
and how long to wait before
touching the starter,
and you overlook each burn hole in the
upholstery
and each spring
poking through the fabric.
your car has been in and out of
police impounds,
has been ticketed for various
malfunctions:
broken wipers,
no turn signals, missing
brake light, broken tail lights, bad
brakes, excessive
exhaust and so forth
but in spite of everything
you knew you were in good hands,
there was never an accident, the
old car moved you from one place to
another,
faithfully
- the poor man's miracle.
so when that last breakdown did occur,
when the valves quit,
when the tired pistons
cracked, or the
crankshaft failed and
you sold it for
junk
- you then had to watch it carted
away
hanging there
from the back of the tow truck
wheeled off
as if it had no
soul,
the bald rear tires
the cracked back window and
the twisted license plate
were the last things you
saw, and it
hurt
as if some woman you loved very
much
and lived with
year after year
had died
and now you
would never
again know
her music
her magic
her unbelievable
fidelity.

[Froderik]

the feeling I get
driving past the railroad yard
(never on purpose but on my way to somewhere)
are the feelings other men have for other things.
I see the tracks and all the boxcars
the tank cars the flat cars
all of them motionless and so many of them
perfectly lined up and not an engine anywhere
(where are all the engines?)
I drive past looking sideways at it all
a wide, still railroad yard
not a human in sight
then I am past the yard
and it wasn't just the romance of it all
that gives me what I get
but something back there nameless
always making me feel better
as some men feel better looking at the open sea
or the mountains or at wild animals
or at a woman
I like those things too
especially the wild animals and the woman
but when I see those lovely old boxcars
with their faded painted lettering
and those flat cars and those fat round tankers
all lined up and waiting
I get quiet inside
I get what other men get from other things
I just feel better and it's good to feel better
whenever you can
not needing a reason.

[Froderik]

as the wind breaks in from the sea again
and the land is marred with riot and disorder
be careful with the sabre of choice,
remember
what may have been noble
5 centuries
or even 20 years ago
is now
more often than not
wasted action
your life runs but once,
history has chance after chance
to prove men fools.

be careful, then, I would say,
of any seeming noble
deed
ideal
or action,
be for this country or love or Art,
be not taken by the nearness of the minute
or a beauty or politic
that will wilt like a cut flower;
love, yes, but not as a task of marriage,
and beware bad food and excessive labor;
live in a country, you must,
but love is not an order
either of woman or the land;
take your time; and drink as much as is needed
in order to maintain continuance,
for drink is a form of life
wherein the partaker returns to a new chance
at life; furthermore, I say,
live alone as much as possible;
bear children if it happens
but try not to bear
raising them; engage not in small arguments
of hand or voice
unless the foe seeks the life of your body
or the life of your soul; then,
kill, if necessary; and
when it comes time to die
do not be selfish:
consider it inexpensive
and where you are going:
neither a mark of shame or failure
or a call upon sorrow
as the wind breaks in from the sea
and time goes on
flushing your bones with soft peace.

[Froderik]

the most binding labor
is
trying to make it
under a sanctified
banner.
similarity of intention
with others
marks the fool from the
explorer

you can learn this at
any
poolhall, racetrack, bar
university or
jail.

people run from rain but
sit
in bathtubs full of
water.

it is fairly dismal to know that
millions of people are worried about
the hydrogen bomb
yet
they are already
dead.

yet they keep trying to make
women
money
sense.

and finally the Great Bartender will lean forward
white and pure and strong and mystic
to tell you that you've had
enough
just when you feel like
you're getting
started.

[Froderik]

one of the problems is
that when most people
sit down to write a poem
they think,
“now I am going to write a
poem”
and then
they go on to write a poem
that
sounds like a poem
or what they think
a poem should sound like.

this is one of their
problems.
of course, there are other
problems:
those writers of poems
that sound like poems
think that they then must
go around
reading them
to other people.

this, they say, is done
for status and recognition
(they are careful
not to mention
vanity
or the need for
instantaneous
approbation
from some
sparse, addled
crowd.)

the best poems
it seems to me
are written out of
an ultimate
need.
and once the poem is
written,
the only need
after that
is to write
another.

and the silence
of the printed page
is the best response
to a finished
work.

in decades past
I once warned
some poet-friends
of mine
about the masturbatory
nature of poetry readings
done just
for the applause of
a handful
of idiots.

“isolate yourself and
do your work and if you
must mix, then do it
with those who
have no interest at all
in what you consider
so
important.”

such anger,
such a self-righteous
response
did I receive then
from my poet-friends
that it seemed to me
that I had exactly
proved my
point.

after that,
we all drifted
apart.

and that solved just
one of my
problems
and I suppose
just one
of theirs.

[Froderik]

"If you're going to try, go all the way. Otherwise, don't even start. This could mean losing girlfriends, wives, relatives and maybe even your mind. It could mean not eating for three or four days. It could mean freezing on a park bench. It could mean jail. It could mean derision. It could mean mockery--isolation. Isolation is the gift. All the others are a test of your endurance, of how much you really want to do it. And, you'll do it, despite rejection and the worst odds. And it will be better than anything else you can imagine. If you're going to try, go all the way. There is no other feeling like that. You will be alone with the gods, and the nights will flame with fire. You will ride life straight to perfect laughter. It's the only good fight there is."


"Pain is strange. A cat killing a bird, a car accident, a fire.... Pain arrives, BANG, and there it is, it sits on you. It's real. And to anybody watching, you look foolish. Like you've suddenly become an idiot. There's no cure for it unless you know somebody who understands how you feel, and knows how to help."


"We're all going to die, all of us, what a circus! That alone should make us love each other but it doesn't. We are terrorized and flattened by trivialities, we are eaten up by nothing."


"Boring damned people. All over the earth. Propagating more boring damned people. What a horror show. The earth swarmed with them."


"You begin saving the world by saving one man at a time; all else is grandiose romanticism or politics."


"An intellectual says a simple thing in a hard way. An artist says a hard thing in a simple way."


"If you're losing your soul and you know it, then you've still got a soul left to lose."


"Real loneliness is not necessarily limited to when you are alone."


"Sometimes you just have to pee in the sink."


"Sex is kicking death in the ass while singing."