What Matters Most is How Well You Walk Through the Fire (10 page)

lost my ass at the races

now sitting with the flu

listening to Wagner on the radio

I've got this small heater humming.

I'm not dead yet

yet not dead

I want to see more kneecaps under

tight nylon hose.

I'm re-grouping,

I'm dreaming up the counter-attack.

lost my ass at the races

the Sierra Madre smiling at me

lost my ass at the races

walked through a wall of defeat.

I saw a dead cat this morning

both front legs sheared off

he was lying by the garbage can

as I walked by.

this is the hardest game

defeat grows like flowers

the whores sit in chairs before their doorways

Attila the Hun sleeps in a rubber mask at night.

Wagner died, Rimbaud quit writing, Christ spit it out.

I lost my ass at the races today

and was reminded of history

of waste and of error

and of strangled dreams.

we want it too easy

and this is the hardest game.

the small heater hums

as I smoke

looking at the walls.

listening to Richard Strauss

is most pleasant

when you are blindfolded and up

against the wall again

facing old Spanish muskets and the

heat and the dust, the

blue head of death.

listening to Richard Strauss

reveals flashes of orange, grey and white

light,

lemonade, and cats crouched in the shade

in polarized

afternoons.

things get bad for all of

us, almost continually,

and what we do under the constant

stress

reveals

who/what we are.

Richard Strauss

is a colorful rush of craft and feeling,

he's like a loaf of french bread

cut the long way

and then loaded with all the ingredients.

it's just

right.

I leave my door open and the cats of the

neighborhood all come in. they walk over to me

and across the top of my couch

and into the bathroom, and one of them goes to

sleep on my

bed. one other sits by me and we listen

to Richard Strauss.

we're in trouble but we don't

know what to do.

again and again

young men write me

the same letter:

“I can't write, but I

want to write. I

read your stuff

and I want to

write just like you.

can you

please tell me something

that will help?”

all around me the

hills are on fire,

floodwaters run

through here

swarming with

rats.

the streets roar

and yawn to

swallow me.

I'm choking

and can't breathe.

they want to write?

like me?

what do they mean?

what's writing?

I only want to go to

bed

close my eyes

and sleep

forever.

born next to cold dogs and

railroad tracks.

born to live with the

lost.

born among faces

uglier than anything

life could

devise.

born to see the 7

horse break its

leg

at 3:42 in the

afternoon.

born to lose another

woman—

clothes gone from

closet,

hairpins

lotions

lipstick

rings

left

behind.

born to dance on

one leg.

born to sit around

and watch flies

frogs

and roaches.

born to sever fingers

on the edge of

tuna cans.

born to walk about

with guts

shot out

from front to

back.

born again

and

again and

again.

she passed from one important man

to another,

from bed to bed

from man to man

all of them

society's important men:

politicians, athletes, artists,

lawyers, doctors, entertainers,

producers, financiers,

and they all gave her one thing

or another:

gifts, money, publication,

publicity and/or

the good life.

but when she suddenly died

at 32

the only ones at her funeral

were

an aunt from Virginia

her bookie

her dope dealer

a bartender

an alcoholic neighbor

and several hired hands at the

graveyard.

but she held

2 final aces

and had the last laugh:

she'd never worked an

8 hour day

and they buried her

with all the gold

in her teeth.

speaking about going crazy

I have been thinking about

mermaids lately.

but I can't place them

properly in my

mind.

one problem that bothers

me

is where are their sexual

organs located?

do they use toilet paper?

and can they stand

on their flipper

while frying bacon and

eggs?

I think

I'd like a mermaid

to love.

sometimes in the supermarket

I see crabs and baby

octopi

and I think, well,

I could feed her that.

but how would I pack her

around at the racetrack?

I get my things and then

push my cart to the

checkout stand.

“how are you today?” she

asks.

“o.k.,” I say.

she has on a

market uniform

flat shoes

earrings

a little cap

pantyhose.

she rings up my

purchases. I know

where her sexual organs

are located as

I look out the

plate glass window

and wait.

just thinking about

writing this poem has

already almost made me

sick

but I'll try it one more

time.

it was in Salt Lake

City

and I had the

flu

and it was cold

and I was in my

shirtsleeves.

I had given my

reading and was

ready to fly

back to L.A.

but I was with

2 girls who wanted

to make the bars

and we went into

this one place

and the girls wanted

to sit near the

front.

there was a

boy on the stage

a Japanese cowboy

and he could

holler.

I had to

make the men's room

and I ran in

there

and the urinal was

like a large shallow

bathtub

and it was

clogged and

full of urine

gently spilling across

the floor.

the entire floor

was wet

and I almost puked

into that flowing

tide of piss.

I came out and

got the girls

out of there.

that time

I didn't tip for

table service.

I'm still not

sure

which was worse—

the men's room

or that Japanese

cowboy.

that's Mormon

territory and clearly

there's work to be

done.

wives' heads are

battered

against kitchen

walls

by unemployed

butchers.

pimps

send out their

dreary and doped

battalions

of tired

girls.

upstairs a man

pukes

his entire stomach

into a

wastebasket.

we all drink

too much

cheap wine

search for

cigarettes

look at our

mates

across

tabletops

and wonder why

they became

ugly

so soon.

we turn our

TV's on

searching for

baseball games

soaps

and

cop

shows

but it's only

the sound

we want

some minor

distraction.

nobody cares

about

endings

we know the

end.

some of us

weaken

some of us

become

sniffers of

Christ.

some don't.

to know anything is

to score

and to score

is

necessary

that's

baseball

and that's all

the rest

of it

too.

one goes from being a poet

to being an entertainer.

I read my stuff in Florida once

and the professor there

told me, “you realize you're

an entertainer now, don't

you?”

I began to

feel bad about that remark

because when the crowd

comes to be entertained by

you

then you become somehow

suspect.

and so, another time,

starting from Los Angeles

we took to the air and

the flight captain introduced

himself as

“Captain Goodwine,”

and thousands of miles

later I found myself transferred

to a small 2-engine

plane and we took off and

the stewardess put a drink

in my hand

took my money and then

hollered, “drink up,

we're landing!”

we landed

took off again and she put

another drink in my hand,

took my money and then

hollered, “drink up,

we're landing!”

the 3rd time I ordered

2 drinks

although we only landed

once more.

I read twice that night in Arkansas

and ended up in a home with

clean rugs, a serving bar, a fireplace

and professors who spoke about budgets

and Fulbright scholarships, and where

the wives of the professors

sat very quietly without speaking.

they were all waiting for me

the entertainer

who had flown in with Captain

Goodwine to

entertain them to make a move on

someone's wife to break the windows

to piss on the rug to play the

fool to make them feel superior

to make them feel hip and liberated.

if I would only stick a cigarette

up the cat's ass!

if I would only take the

willing co-ed

who was doing a term paper on

Chinaski!

but I got up and went to my

poet's bedroom

closed the door

took off my clothes

went to bed and

went to sleep

thereby

entertaining myself

the best way

I knew

how.

I awakened about 10:30 a.m.

Sunday morning

and I sat straight up in bed

and I said,

“o, Jesus Christ!”

and she said,

“what's the matter, Hank?”

and I said, “it's my car. do you

remember where we parked last night?”

and she said,

“no, I don't.”

and I said,

“well, I think there's something strange going on.”

and I got dressed and went out on the street.

I was worried.

I had no idea where the car was

and I walked up my street and down the next

street and I didn't see it.

I have love affairs with my cars

and the older they are and/or the longer I have them

the more I care.

this one was an ancient love.

—then three blocks to the west I saw it:

parked dead center in the middle of a very narrow

street. nobody could enter the street or leave it.

my car sat there calmly like a forgotten drunk.

I walked over, got in, put the key in, and it

started.

there was no ticket.

I felt good.

I drove it to my street and parked it

carefully.

I walked back up the stairway and opened the

door.

“well, is your car all right?” she asked.

“yeah, I found it,” I said, “guess where it…”

“
you worry too much about that god-damned car!
”

she snapped. “did you bring back any 7-Up, any beer?

I need something
now!
”

I undressed and got back into bed and

pushed my fat ass up against her fat

belly and never said another

word.