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    The Pleasures of the Damned

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      we are rusty with sadness and

      feverish

      with climbing broken ladders.

      Take us:

      we were never children

      like your children.

      We do not understand love songs

      like your inamorata.

      Our faces are cracked linoleum,

      cracked through with the heavy, sure

      feet of our masters.

      We are shot through with carrot tops

      and poppyseed and tilted grammar;

      we waste days like mad blackbirds

      and pray for alcoholic nights.

      Our silk-sick human smiles wrap around

      us like somebody else’s confetti:

      we do not even belong to the Party.

      We are a scene chalked-out with the

      sick white brush of Age.

      We smoke, asleep as a dish of figs.

      We smoke, dead as a fog.

      Take us.

      A bathtub murder

      or something quick and bright; our names

      in the papers.

      Known, at last, for a moment

      to millions of careless and grape-dull eyes

      that hold themselves private

      to only flicker and flame

      at the poor cracker-barrel jibes

      of their conceited, pampered correct comedians.

      Known, at last, for a moment,

      as they will be known

      and as you will be known

      by an all-gray man on an all-gray horse

      who sits and fondles a sword

      longer than the night

      longer than the mountain’s aching backbone

      longer than all the cries

      that have a-bombed up out of throats

      and exploded in a newer, less-planned

      land.

      We smoke and the clouds do not notice us.

      A cat walks by and shakes Shakespeare off of his back.

      Tallow, tallow, candle like wax: our spines

      are limp and our consciousness burns

      guilelessly away

      the remaining wick life has

      doled out to us.

      An old man asked me for a cigarette

      and told me his troubles

      and this

      is what he said:

      that Age was a crime

      and that Pity picked up the marbles

      and that Hatred picked up the

      cash.

      He might have been your father

      or mine.

      He might have been a sex-fiend

      or a saint.

      But what ever he was,

      he was condemned

      and we stood in the sun and

      smoked

      and looked around

      in our leisure

      to see who was next in

      line.

      my fate

      like the fox

      I run with the hunted

      and if I’m not

      the happiest man

      on earth

      I’m surely the

      luckiest man

      alive.

      (uncollected)

      my atomic stockpile

      I cleaned my place the other day

      first time in ten years

      and found 100 rejected poems:

      I fastened them all to a clipboard

      (much bad reading).

      now I will clean their teeth

      fill their cavities

      give them eye and ear examinations

      weigh them

      offer blood transfusions

      then send them out again into the

      sick world of posey.

      either that

      or I must burn down your cities,

      rape your women,

      murder your men,

      enslave your children.

      every time I clean my room

      the world trembles in the balance.

      that’s why I only do it once every

      ten years.

      (uncollected)

      Bruckner (2)

      Bruckner wasn’t bad

      even though he got down

      on his knees

      and proclaimed Wagner

      the master.

      it saddens me, I guess,

      in a small way

      because while Wagner was

      hitting all those homers

      Bruckner was sacrificing

      the runners to second

      and he knew it.

      and I know that

      mixing baseball metaphors with classical

      music

      will not please the purists

      either.

      I prefer Ruth to most of his teammates

      but I appreciate those others who did

      the best they could

      and kept on doing it

      even when they knew they

      were second best.

      this is your club fighter

      your back-up quarterback

      the unknown jock who sometimes

      brings one in

      at 40-to-one.

      this was Bruckner.

      there are times when we should

      remember

      the strange courage

      of the second-rate

      who refuse to quit

      when the nights

      are black and long and sleepless

      and the days are without

      end.

      hello, how are you?

      this fear of being what they are:

      dead.

      at least they are not out on the street, they

      are careful to stay indoors, those

      pasty mad who sit alone before their TV sets,

      their lives full of canned, mutilated laughter.

      their ideal neighborhood

      of parked cars

      of little green lawns

      of little homes

      the little doors that open and close

      as their relatives visit

      throughout the holidays

      the doors closing

      behind the dying who die so slowly

      behind the dead who are still alive

      in your quiet average neighborhood

      of winding streets

      of agony

      of confusion

      of horror

      of fear

      of ignorance.

      a dog standing behind a fence.

      a man silent at the window.

      vacancy

      sun-stroked women

      without men

      on a Santa Monica Monday;

      the men are working or in jail

      or insane;

      one girl floats in a rubber suit,

      waiting…

      houses slide off the edges of cliffs

      and down into the sea.

      the bars are empty

      the lobster eating houses are empty;

      it’s a recession, they say,

      the good days are

      over.

      you can’t tell an unemployed man

      from an artist any more,

      they all look alike

      and the women look the same,

      only a little more desperate.

      we stop at a hippie hole

      in Topanga Canyon…

      and wait, wait, wait;

      the whole area of the canyon and the beach

      is listless

      useless

      VACANCY, it says, PEOPLE WANTED.

      the wood has no fire

      the sea is dirty

      the hills are dry

      the temples have no bells

      love has no bed

      sun-stroked women without men

      one sailboat

      life drowned.

      batting slump

      the sun slides down through the shades.

      I have a pair of black shoes and a pair of

      brown shoes.

      I can hardly remember the girls of my youth.

      there is numb blood pulsing thro
    ugh the

      falcon and the hyena and the pimp

      and there’s no escaping this unreasonable

      sorrow.

      there’s crabgrass and razor wire and the snoring

      of my cat.

      there are lifeguards sitting in canvas-back chairs

      with salt rotting under their toenails.

      there’s the hunter with eyes like rose

      petals.

      sorrow, yes, it pulls at me

      I don’t know why.

      avenues of despair slide into my ears.

      the worms won’t sing.

      the Babe swings again

      missing a 3-and-2 pitch

      twisting around himself

      leaning over his

      whiskey gut.

      cows give milk

      dentists pull teeth

      thermometers work.

      I can sing the blues

      it doesn’t cost a dime and

      when I lay down to night

      pull up the covers

      there’s the dark factor

      there’s the unknown factor

      there’s this manufactured

      staggering

      black

      empty

      space.

      I got to hit one out of here

      pretty soon.

      bang bang

      absolutely sesamoid

      said the skeleton

      shoving his chalky foot

      upon my desk,

      and that was it,

      bang bang,

      he looked at me,

      and it was my bone body

      and I was what remained,

      and there was a newspaper

      on my desk

      and somebody folded the newspaper

      and I folded,

      I was the newspaper

      under somebody’s arm

      and the sheet of me

      had eyes

      and I saw the skeleton

      watching

      and just before the door closed

      I saw a man who looked

      partly like Napoleon,

      partly like Hitler,

      fighting with my skeleton,

      then the door closed

      and we went down the steps

      and outside

      and I was under

      the arm

      of a fat little man

      who knew nothing

      and I hated him

      for his indifference

      to fact, how I hated him

      as he unfolded me

      in the subway

      and I fell against the back

      of an old woman.

      the pleasures of the damned

      the pleasures of the damned

      are limited to brief moments

      of happiness:

      like the eyes in the look of a dog,

      like a square of wax,

      like a fire taking the city hall,

      the county,

      the continent,

      like fire taking the hair

      of maidens and monsters;

      and hawks buzzing in peach trees,

      the sea running between their claws,

      Time

      drunk and damp,

      everything burning,

      everything wet,

      everything fine.

      one more good one

      to be writing poetry at the age of 50

      like a schoolboy,

      surely, I must be crazy;

      racetracks and booze and arguments

      with the landlord;

      watercolor paintings under the bed

      with dirty socks;

      a bathtub full of trash

      and a garbage can lined with

      underground newspapers;

      a record player that doesn’t work,

      a radio that doesn’t work,

      and I don’t work—

      I sit between 2 lamps,

      bottle on the floor

      begging a 20-year-old typewriter

      to say something, in a way and

      well enough

      so they won’t confuse me

      with the more comfortable

      practitioners;

      this is certainly not a game for

      flyweights or Ping-Pong players—

      all arguments to the contrary.

      —but once you get the taste, it’s good to get your

      teeth into

      words. I forgive those who

      can’t quit.

      I forgive myself.

      this is where the action is,

      this is the hot horse that

      comes in.

      there’s no grander fort

      no better flag

      no better woman

      no better way; yet there’s much else to say—

      there seems as much hell in it as

      magic; death gets as close as any lover has,

      closer,

      you know it like your right hand

      like a mark on the wall

      like your daughter’s name,

      you know it like the face on the corner

      newsboy,

      and you sit there with flowers and houses

      with dogs and death and a boil on the neck,

      you sit down and do it again and again

      the machinegun chattering by the window

      as the people walk by

      as you sit in your undershirt,

      50, on an indelicate March evening,

      as their faces look in and help you write the next 5

      lines,

      as they walk by and say,

      “the old man in the window, what’s the deal with

      him?”

      —fucked by the muse, friends,

      thank you—

      and I roll a cigarette with one hand

      like the old bum

      I am, and then thank and curse the gods

      alike,

      lean forward

      drag on the cigarette

      think of the good fighters

      like poor Hem, poor Beau Jack, poor Sugar Ray,

      poor Kid Gavilan, poor Villon, poor Babe, poor

      Hart Crane, poor

      me, hahaha.

      I lean forward,

      redhot ash

      falling on my wrists,

      teeth into the word.

      crazy at the age of 50,

      I send it

      home.

      the little girls hissed

      since my last name was Fuch, he said to Raymond, you can

      believe the school yard was tough: they put itching

      powder down my neck, threw gravel at me, stung me

      with rubber bands in class, and outside they called

      me names, well, one name mainly, over and over,

      and on top of all that my parents were poor, I wore

      cardboard in my shoes to fill in the holes in the

      soles, my pants were patched, my shirts threadbare;

      and even my teachers ganged up

      on me, they slammed my

      palm with rulers and sent me to the principal’s office as

      if I was really guilty of something;

      and, of course, the abuse kept coming from my classmates;

      I was stoned, beaten, pissed on;

      the little girls hissed and stuck their tongues out

      at me…

      Fuch’s wife smiled sadly at Raymond: my poor darling husband had

      such a terrible childhood!

      (she was so beautiful it almost stunned one to look at

      her.)

      Fuch looked at Raymond: hey, your glass is empty.

      yeah, said Raymond.

      Fuch touched a button and the English butler silently

      glided in. he nodded respectfully to Raymond and in his

      beautiful accent asked, another drink, sir?

      yes, please, Raymond answered.

      the butler went off to prepare the drink.

      what hurt most, of course, continued Fuch, was the name

    &nb
    sp; calling.

      Raymond asked, have you never forgotten it?

      I did for a while, but then strangely I began to

      miss the abuse…

      the butler returned carrying Raymond’s

      drink on a silver tray.

      here is your drink, sir, said the butler.

      thank you, said Raymond, taking it off the tray.

      o.k., Paul, Fuch said to the butler, you can

      start now.

      now? asked the butler.

      now, came the answer.

      the butler stood in front of Fuch and screamed:

      fucky-boy! fucky-baby! fuck-face! fuck-brain!

      where did your name come from, fuck-head?

      how come you’re such a fuck-up?

      etc….

      they all started laughing uncontrollably

      as the butler delivered his tirade in that

      beautiful British accent.

      they couldn’t stop laughing, they fell out of their

      chairs and got down on the rug, pounding it and

     
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