Bukowski, Charles: I Meet The Famous Poet

this poet had long been famous

and after some decades of

obscurity I

got lucky

and this poet appeared

interested

and asked me to his

beach apartment.

he was homosexual and I was

straight, and worse, a

lush.

I came by, looked

about and

declaimed (as if I didn't

know), "hey, where the

fuck are the

babies?"

he just smiled and stroked

his mustache.

he had little lettuces and

delicate cheeses and

other dainties

in his refrigerator.

"where you keep you fucking

beer, man?" I

asked.

it didn't matter, I had

brought my own

bottles and I began upon

them.

he began to look

alarmed: "I've heard about

your brutality, please desist from

that!"

I flopped down on his

couch, belched: "ah, shit, baby, I'm

not gonna hurt ya! ha, ha,

ha!"

"you are a fine writer," he

said, "but as a person you are

utterly

despicable!"

"that's what I like about me

best, baby!" I

continued to pour them

down

at once

he seemed to vanish behind

some sliding wooden

doors.

"hey, baby, come on

out! I ain't gonna do no

bad! we can sit around and

talk that dumb literary

bullshit all night

long! I won't

brutalize you,

shit, I

promise!"

"I don't trust you,"

came the little

voice

well, there was nothing to

do

but slug it down, I was

too drunk to drive

home.

 

when I awakened in the

morning he was standing over

me

smiling.

"uh," I said,

"hi..."

"did you mean what you

said last night? he

asked.

"uh, what wuz

ut?"

"I slid the doors back and

stood there and you saw

me and you said that

I looked like I was riding the

prow of some great sea

ship... you said that

I looked like a

norseman! is

that true?"

"oh, yeah, yeah, you

did..."

he fixed me some hot tea

with toast

and I got that

down.

"well," I said, "good to

have met

you..."

"I'm sure," he

answered.

the door closed behind

me

and I found the elevator

down

and

after some wandering about the

beach front

I found my car, got

in, drove off

on what appeared to be

favorable terms

between the famous poet and

myself

but

it wasn't

so:

he started writing un-

beliable hateful stuff

about

me

and I

got my shots in at

him.

the whole matter

was just about

like

most other writers

meeting

 

and

anyhow

that part about

calling him a

Norseman

wasn't true at

all: I called him

a Viking

and it also

isn't true

that without his

aid

I never would have

appeared in the

Penguin Collection of

Modern Poets

along with him

and who

was it?

yeah:

Lamantia.