For Charles Bukowski In All His Madness 
  
Oh Charles! 
How alien we are in this alien world! 
Flopping around in this sizzling frying pan, 
wishing our heads were resting on the guillotine block, 
waiting for the axe to fall, 
relieving us all of this tar paper shack syndrome that plagues us, 
haunts us, 
stalks us, 
from this waking world, 
deep into our midnight dreams. 
Oh if poetry could fly us to the moon! 
Rocket us to Mars! 
Where like Martians we would walk about in thin skins, 
covered by some shiny exterior, 
breathing filtered Martian air, 
dreaming filtered Martian dreams, 
writing filtered poetry about filtered home, 
angered by how much filtered home betrayed us. 
So it is, this timeless time, 
remarking as we stumble through life, 
typing lines that don't make sense, 
composing prose that doesn't get us anywhere in this filtered chaos, 
as we chew on stale bread, drink rancid beer, 
like some homeless person, 
lost in a dark alley, 
hoping some light will lead us into tomorrow, 
finally laying our heads down on some soiled brick of baked clay, 
next to some stinking dumpster, 
thinking in our confused thoughts, 
"Surely there must be some other fool more foolish than myself", 
waking in the dark of night, 
finding some demon mugger standing over us, 
knife blade glinting in a ray of mirrored street. 
Once we're robbed and bleeding, 
left for dead, 
nickels and dimes stolen from our pockets, 
perhaps we rise again, 
pull the filthy collar of our worn out coat up around our ears, 
trying to keep out life, 
trying to imagine something beyond the hellish beast that growls at us, 
each and every day, 
nipping at our heels,
gnawing at our lives.
Oh words! Why hast thou forsaken me! 
What sin have I committed? 
What prayer have I not recited? 
Why does existence shun me as I plead for mercy? 
Such is life, 
as I breathe and sleep and murmur words that fall unheard into the gutter. 
If the sun didn't get up tomorrow perhaps I would find atonement, 
understand how failing, 
how failure makes the world go round. 
If the stars blinked out, 
one by one, 
maybe I'd wake in that darkness, 
thinking to myself, 
"This must be heaven, my mother's womb, 
this must be the place where I am reborn",
but then who isn't reborn each time they wake? 
But in the dark? 
Who doesn't begin life anew each time they fall down, 
pick themselves up, 
wipe themselves off,
amble into the ample light of each newly filtered day? 
But Charles! 
In my madness, 
I strip, 
walk naked down a desolate street,
seeking new clothing, 
a new skin, 
new words, 
new poetry,  
that doesn't fail me, 
new prose, 
that grabs me by the scruff of the neck,
lifts me up, 
dresses me,
covering my shame,
in a vibrant new light.