AllPoetry Contest entry. Assignment: Write a letter to the editor about poetry – Bukowski style. Bit of a departure for me. I don’t think I would like him as a person and I may get yelled at for that. Usually when I read his work, I feel like he needed a good smack, but here it is anyway 🙂 Update: Won GOLD by the way 🙂
dear editor
(it says that on your door)
I come to this page
over and over
hoping for something
on fire or at least
smoldering
instead of cold stinking
morning after soot about “he
done me wrong and I don’t think
I can write again”
minimum requirements should
be could we sit down and
talk about it over a beer
for more than ten minutes
without one of us needing
to take a leak
or letting minds wander
to the waitress’ cleavage
there is more fire in that
shadow than this
rag ever prints
(make it my obituary –
I’ll pay extra)
yours,
smug, slightly bitchy poet
Am inclined to agree with you about Bukowski, but he could occasionally let loose with a good snarky remark. Love your poem, especially those last closing lines: will keep those in mind; might need to use them later, if the right moment appears…
lol – I’m up for a finalist so I musta done good 🙂
Ooh, I love the edge to this..you really got under the skin of that ‘smug’ poet! (I don’t think she was smug..just thwarted) -the ‘taking a leak’ line was my utter favourite..screams of the frustration and dislike..thanks as ever for your visit..Jae
My problem has always been the “Thumper” syndrome. If you can’t say nothin nice, don’t say nothin at all. Every now and then I slap it and shut it up lol
With Anno on CB. We get all of him, voluminously, so there is always something to find. My students, those who find him, love him, as he lived in the outerlands in which they find themselves.
All by way of saying that this rocks, poem as poem, whether CB-ish or not. Gold? This one goes platinum.
ha grinning now…It was fun to put on Bukowski for a bit, even if I do think he was a cranky drunk with a bad attitude. A friend told me I should read his biography before passing judgment so I guess I will read and see if it changes my mind.