Come On In!. Charles Bukowski

worry, Dostoevsky,

      the fish and the hills and the harbor

      and the girls and the horses and the

      alleys and the nights and the dogs

      and the knives and the poisons and

      the wines and the midgets and the

      gamblers and the lights and the guns

      and the lies and the sacrifices

      and the flies and the frogs and the

      flags and the doors and the windows

      and the stairways and the cigarettes

      and the hotels and myself have been

      around a long time.

      just like you.

       poets to the rescue

      the night the poets dropped by to say

      hello

      was at the time

      that terrible time when

      the ladies on the telephone

      were screaming their fury

      at me.

      the night the poets came by to say

      hello

      I offered them cigarettes

      as they talked about the

      poet

      who traveled all the way to Paris

      in order to be able

      to select the contents

      of his next book

      and we smiled at that

      the poets and I

      as we remembered starvation

      dark mornings

      deadly noons

      evenings of elephantine

      misery.

      the night the poets came by to say

      hello

      we also mused about whatever happened to

      Barney Google with the googly

      eyes: he probably died for the love of

      a strumpet as many good men

      have