Betting on the Muse - 100 poems and 10 short stories collected here, previously unpublished works by the one and only Bukowski. The range covers Hank's entire life, beginning with such poems as The Monkey, recounting the time an organ grinder wandered into the neighborhood when Chuck was a kid to a short snapping turtle of a poem called challenge in the dark, where Bu is face-to-face with death.
Assuming anyone reading my words is a reader or writer, I'd like to share two Bukowski poems to serve as inspiration to keep the power of imagination and creativity going in your own life, no matter how tough the odds. Here goes:
betting on the muse
Jimmy Foxx died an alcoholic
in a skidrow hotel
room.
Beau Jack ending up shining
shoes,
just where he
began.
there are dozens, hundreds,
more, maybe
thousands more.
being an athlete grown old
is one of the cruelest of
fates,
to be replaced by others,
to no longer hear the
cheers and the plaudits,
to no longer be
recognized,
just to be an old man
like other old
men.
to almost not believe it
yourself,
to check the scrapbook
with the yellowing
pages.
there you are,
smiling;
there you are,
victorious;
there you are,
young.
the crowd has other
heroes.
the crowd never
dies,
never grows
old
but the crowd often
forgets.
now the telephone doesn't ring,
the young girls are
gone,
the party is
over.
this is why I chose
to be a
writer.
if you're worth just
half-a-damn
you can keep your
hustle going
until the last minute
of the last
day.
you can keep
getting better instead
of worse,
you can still keep
hitting them over the
wall.
through darkness, war,
good and bad
luck
you keep it going,
hitting them out,
the flashing lightning
of the word,
beating life at life,
and death too late to
truly win
against
you.
the laughing heart
your life is your life
don't let it be clubbed into dank
submission.
be on the watch
there are ways out.
there is light somewhere.
it may not be much light but
it beats the darkness.
be on the watch.
the gods will offer you
chances.
know them, take them.
you can't beat death but
you can beat death
in life,
sometimes,
and the more often you
learn to do it,
the more light there will
be.
your life is your life.
know it while you have
it.
you are marvelous
the gods wait to delight
in
you.
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