You Get So Alone at Times That It Just Makes Sense Read online

  meeting Pound, Picasso, A. Huxley, Lawrence, Joyce,

  F. Scott, Hemingway, many

  others;

  the famous were like precious toys to

  them,

  and the way it reads

  the famous allowed themselves to become

  precious toys.

  all through the book

  I waited for just one of the famous

  to tell this rich literary lady and her

  rich literary husband to

  get off and out

  but, apparently, none of them ever

  did.

  Instead they were photographed with the lady

  and her husband

  at various seasides

  looking intelligent

  as if all this was part of the act

  of Art.

  perhaps because the wife and husband

  fronted a lush press that

  had something to do

  with it.

  and they were all photographed together

  at parties

  or outside of Sylvia Beach’s bookshop.

  it’s true that many of them were

  great and/or original artists,

  but it all seems such a snobby precious

  affair,

  and the husband finally committed his

  threatened suicide

  and the lady published one of my first

  short stories in the

  40’s and is now

  dead, yet

  I can’t forgive either of them

  for their rich dumb lives

  and I can’t forgive their precious toys

  either

  for being

  that.

  no help for that

  there is a place in the heart that

  will never be filled

  a space

  and even during the

  best moments

  and

  the greatest

  times

  we will know it

  we will know it

  more than

  ever

  there is a place in the heart that

  will never be filled

  and

  we will wait

  and

  wait

  in that

  space.

  my non-ambitious ambition

  my father had little sayings which he mostly shared

  during dinner sessions; food made him think of

  survival:

  “succeed or suck eggs…”

  “the early bird gets the worm…”

  “early to bed and early to rise makes a man (etc.)…”

  “anybody who wants to can make it in America…”

  “God takes care of those who (etc.)…”

  I had no particular idea who he was talking

  to, and personally I thought him a

  crazed and stupid brute

  but my mother always interspersed these

  sessions with: “Henry, listen to your

  father.”

  at that age I didn’t have any other

  choice

  but as the food went down with the

  sayings

  the appetite and the digestion went

  along with them.

  it seemed to me that I had never met

  another person on earth

  as discouraging to my happiness

  as my father.

  and it appeared that I had

  the same effect upon

  him.

  “You are a bum,” he told me, “and you’ll

  always be a bum!”

  and I thought, if being a bum is to be the

  opposite of what this son-of-a-bitch

  is, then that’s what I’m going to

  be.

  and it’s too bad he’s been dead

  so long

  for now he can’t see

  how beautifully I’ve succeeded

  at

  that.

  education

  at that small inkwell desk

  I had trouble with the words

  “sing” and “sign.”

  I don’t know why

  but

  “sing” and “sign”:

  it bothered

  me.

  the others went on and learned

  new things

  but I just sat there

  thinking about

  “sing” and “sign.”

  there was something there

  I couldn’t

  overcome.

  what it gave me was a

  bellyache as

  I looked at the backs of all those

  heads.

  the lady teacher had a

  very fierce face

  it ran sharply to a

  point

  and was heavy with white

  powder.

  one afternoon

  she asked my mother to come

  see her

  and I sat with them

  in the classroom

  as they

  talked.

  “he’s not learning

  anything,” the teacher

  told my

  mother.

  “please give him a

  chance, Mrs. Sims!”

  “he’s not trying, Mrs.

  Chinaski!”

  my mother began to

  cry.

  Mrs. Sims sat there

  and watched

  her.

  it went on for some

  minutes.

  then Mrs. Sims said,

  “well, we’ll see what we

  can do…”

  then I was walking with

  my mother

  we were walking in

  front of the school,

  there was much green grass

  and then the

  sidewalk.

  “oh, Henry,” my mother said,

  “your father is so disappointed in

  you, I don’t know what we are

  going to do!”

  father, my mind said,

  father and father and

  father.

  words like that.

  I decided not to learn anything

  in that

  school.

  my mother walked along

  beside me.

  she wasn’t anything at

  all.

  and I had a bellyache

  and even the trees we walked

  under

  seemed less than

  trees

  and more like everything

  else.

  downtown L.A.

  throwing your shoe at 3 a.m. and smashing the window, then sticking

  your head through the shards of glass and laughing as the phone rings

  with authoritative threats as you curse back through the receiver, slam

  it down as the woman screeches: “WHAT THE FUCK YA DOIN’, YA ASSHOLE!”

  you smirk, look at her (what’s this?), you’re cut somewhere, love it, the

  dripping of red onto your dirty torn undershirt, the whiskey roaring

  through your invincibility: you’re young, you’re big, and the world

  stinks from centuries of Humanity while

  you’re on course

  and there’s something left to drink—

  it’s good, it’s a dramatic farce and you can handle it with

  verve, style, grace and elite

  mysticism.

  another hotel drunk—thank god for hotels and whiskey and ladies of the

  street!

  you turn to her: “you chippy hunk of shit, don’t bad mouth me! I’m

  the toughest guy in town, you don’t know who the hell you’re in this room

  with!”

  she just looks, half-believing…a cigarette dangling, she’s half-

  insane, looking for an out; she’s hard, she’s scared, she’s been


  fooled, taken, abused, used, over-

  used…

  but, under all that, to me she’s the flower, I see her as she was

  before she was ruined by the lies: theirs and

  hers.

  to me, she’s new again as I am new: we have a chance

  together.

  I walk over and fill her drink: “you got class, doll, you’re not like the

  others…”

  she likes that and I like it too because to make a thing true all you’ve

  got to do is believe.

  I sit across from her as she tells me about her life, I give her refills,

  light her cigarettes, I listen and the City of the Angels

  listens: she’s had a hard row.

  I get sentimental and decide not to fuck her: one more man for her

  won’t help and one more woman for me won’t

  matter—besides, she doesn’t look that

  good.

  actually, her life is boring and rather common but most are—mine is too

  except when lifted by

  whiskey

  she gets into a crying-jag, she’s cute, really, and pitiful, all she wants

  is what she always wanted, only it’s getting further and further

  away.

  then she stops crying, we just drink and smoke, it’s

  peaceful—I won’t bother her that

  night…

  I have trouble trying to yank the pull-down bed from the wall, she

  comes up to help, we pull together—suddenly, it releases—flings

  itelf upon us, a hard death-like mindless object, it knocks us upon

  our asses beneath it as

  first in fear we scream

  then begin laughing, laughing like

  crazy.

  she gets the bathroom first, then I use it, then we stretch out and

  sleep.

  I am awakened in the early morning…she is down at my center, she has

  me in her mouth and is working furiously.

  “it’s all right,” I say, “you don’t have to do

  that.”

  she continues, finishes…

  in the morning we pass the desk clerk, he has on thick-rimmed dark glasses,

  seems to sit in the shade of some tarantula dream: he was there when we

  entered, he is there now: some eternal darkness, we are almost to the door

  when he says:

  “don’t come back.”

  we walk 2 blocks up, turn left, walk one block, then one block south, enter

  Willie’s at the middle of the

  block, place ourselves at bar

  center.

  we order beer for starters, we sit there as she searches her purse for

  cigarettes, then I get up, move toward the juke box, put a coin

  within, come back, sit down, she lifts her glass, “the first one’s best,”

  and I lift my drink, “and the last…”

  outside, the traffic runs up and down, down and

  up,

  going

  nowhere.

  another casualty

  cat got run over

  now silver screw holding together a broken

  femur

  right leg

  bound in bright red

  bandage

  got cat home from vet’s

  took my eye off

  him for

  a moment

  he ran across floor

  dragging his red

  leg

  chasing the female

  cat

  worst thing the

  fucker could

  do

  he’s in the penalty

  box

  now

  sweating it

  out

  he’s just like the

  rest of

  us

  he has these large

  yellow eyes

  staring

  only wanting to

  live the

  good

  life.

  driving test

  drivers

  in defense and anger

  often give the

  finger

  to those

  who become involved in their

  driving problems.

  I am aware what the

  signal of the finger

  implies

  yet when it is directed

  at me

  sometimes

  I can’t help laughing at

  the florid

  twisted

  faces

  and

  the gesture.

  yet today

  I found myself

  giving the finger

  to some guy

  who pulled directly

  into my lane

  without waiting

  from a supermarket

  exit.

  I shook the finger at

  him.

  he saw it

  and I drove along right on his

  rear

  bumper.

  it was my first

  time.

  I was a member of the

  club

  and I felt like a

  fucking

  fool.

  that’s why funerals are so sad

  he’s got all the tools but he’s lazy, has no

  fire, the ladies drain his senses, his

  emotions, he just wants to drive his

  flashy car

  he gets a wax job once a month

  throws away his shoes when they get

  scuffed

  but

  he’s got the best right hand in the

  business

  and his left hook can cave in a man’s ribs

  if I can get him to do it

  but

  he has no god damned imagination

  he’s in the top ten

  but the music is missing.

  he makes the money

  but it’s all going to get away from

  him.

  some day he’s not going to be able to do

  even the little

  he’s doing now.

  his idea of victory is to pull down as

  many women’s panties as he

  can.

  he’s

  champ at that.

  and when you see me screaming at him

  in his corner between

  rounds

  I’m trying to awaken him to the fact that

  the TIME is

  NOW.

  he just grins at me:

  “hell, you fight him, he’s a

  bitch…”

  you have no idea, cousin, how many

  men

  can do it

  but

  won’t.

  cornered

  well, they said it would come to

  this: old. talent gone. fumbling for

  the word

  hearing the dark

  footsteps, I turn

  look behind me…

  not yet, old dog…

  soon enough.

  now

  they sit talking about

  me: “yes, it’s happened, he’s

  finished…it’s

  sad…”

  “he never had a great deal, did

  he?”

  “well, no, but now…”

  now

  they are celebrating my demise

  in taverns I no longer

  frequent.

  now

  I drink alone

  at this malfunctioning

  machine

  as the shadows assume

  shapes

  I fight the slow

  retreat

  now

  my once-promise

  dwindling

  dwindling

  now

  lighting new cigarettes

  pouring more

  drinks

  it h
as been a beautiful

  fight

  still

  is.

  bumming with Jane

  there wasn’t a stove

  and we put cans of beans

  in hot water in the sink

  to heat them

  up

  and we read the Sunday papers

  on Monday

  after digging them out of the

  trash cans

  but somehow we managed

  money for wine

  and the

  rent

  and the money came off

  the streets

  out of hock shops

  out of nowhere

  and all that mattered

  was the next

  bottle

  and we drank and sang

  and

  fought

  were in and out

  of drunk

  tanks

  car crashes

  hospitals

  we barricaded ourselves

  against the

  police

  and the other roomers

  hated

  us

  and the desk clerk

  of the hotel

  feared

  us

  and it went on

  and

  on

  and it was one of the

  most wonderful times

  of my

  life.

  darkness

  darkness falls upon Humanity

  and faces become terrible

  things

  that wanted more than there

  was.

  all our days are marked with

  unexpected

  affronts—some

  disastrous, others

  less so

  but the process is

  wearing and

  continuous.

  attrition rules.

  most give