The Last Night of the Earth Poems (29 page)

 

there was Auden, I don’t remember

which small room I first read him

in

and there was Spender and I don’t

know which small room

either

and then there was Ezra

and I remember that room,

there was a torn screen

that the flies came through

and it was Los Angeles

and the woman said to me,

“Jesus Christ, you reading those

Cantos
again!”

she liked e. e. cummings, though,

she thought he was really

good and she was

right.

 

I remember when I read Turgenev,

though, I had just come out of the

drunk tank and I was living

alone

and I thought he was really a

subtle and funny son of a

bitch.

 

Hemingway I read everywhere,

sometimes a few times over

and he made me feel brave

and tough

until one day

it all just stopped cold for me

and worse than that,

Ernie became an

irritant.

my Jeffers period was sometime

in Los Angeles, some room, some

job,

the same woman was back

and she said,

“Jesus, how can you read this

crap?”

one time when she was gone

I found many magazines

under the bed.

I pulled them out

and found that the contents were

all about murder

and it was all about women

who were tortured, killed,

dismembered and so

forth with the

lurid photos

in black and

white.

that stuff wasn’t for

me.

 

my first encounter with Henry

Miller was via paperback

on a bus through Arizona.

he was great when he stuck

to reality

but when he got ethereal

when he got to philosophizing

he got as dry and boring as

the passing

landscape.

I left him in the men’s crapper

at a hamburger

stop.

 

I got hold of Celine’s
Journey

and read it straight through

while in bed eating crackers.

I kept reading, eating the

crackers and reading, reading,

laughing out loud,

thinking, at last I’ve met a man

who writes better than

I.

I finished the book and then

drank much water.

the crackers swelled up

inside of me

and I got the worst

god damned stomach

ache of my

life.

 

I was living with my first

wife.

she worked for the L.A.

Sheriff’s Dept.

and she came in to

find me doubled up

and moaning.

 

“Oh, what happened?”

 

“I’ve just read the world’s

greatest

writer!”

 

“But you said
you
were.”

 

“I’m second, baby…”

 

I read F. D.’s
Notes from the

Underground

in a small El Paso

library

after sleeping the night

on a park bench

during a sand

storm.

after reading that book

I knew I had a long way

to go as a

writer.

 

I don’t know where I read

T. S. Eliot.

he made a small dent

which soon ironed

out.

 

there were many rooms,

many books,

D. H. Lawrence, Gorky,

A. Huxley, Sherwood

Anderson, Sinclair Lewis,

James Thurber, Dos Passos,

etc

Kafka.

Schopenhauer, Nietzsche,

Rabelais.

Hamsun.

 

as a very young man

I worked as a shipping clerk,

made the bars at

night,

came into the roominghouse,

went to bed

and read the

books.

I had 3 or 4 of them in

bed with me (what a

man!) and then I would

sleep.

 

my landlady finally told

me, “You know, you read those

books in bed and about every

hour or so one of them will

fall to the floor.

You are keeping everybody

awake!”

 

(I was on the 3rd floor.)

 

what days and nights those

were.

 

now I can’t read anything,

not even the newspaper.

and, of course, I can’t watch

tv except for the boxing

matches.

I do hear some news

on the car radio

while driving the freeway

and waiting for the

traffic

reports.

 

but you know, my former

life as a bibliophile, it

possibly kept me from

murdering somebody,

myself

included.

it kept me from being an

industrialist.

it allowed me to endure

some women

that most men would never

be able to live

with.

it gave me space, a

pause.

it helped me to write

this

 

(in this room,

like the other rooms)

 

perhaps for some young man

now

needing

to laugh at the

impossibilities

which are here

always

after we are

not.

 

it was just a small room, no bathroom,

hot plate, bed, 2 chairs, a bed, sink,

phone in hall.

I was on the 2nd floor of a hotel.

I had a job.

I got in about 6:30 p.m.

and by 8 p.m.

there would be 4 or 5 people

in the room,

all drunks,

all drinking wine.

sometimes there would be

6 or 7.

most of them sat on the

bed.

oh, there was a radio,

we played the radio,

drank and

talked.

 

it was strange, there was

always a sense of

excitement there,

some laughter and

sometimes serious

arguments that were

somewhat

stupid.

 

we were never asked

to be quiet,

the manager never

bothered us,

or the

police.

with an exception

or two,

there were no

physical

confrontations.

I’d always call an

end to the parties

around 3 a.m.

 

“ah, come on Hank!

we’re just getting

started!”

 

“come on, come

on, everybody

out!”

 

and,

with an exception

or two,

I always slept

without a

lady.

 

we called

that place,

the Hotel from

Hell.

 

I had no idea

what we were

trying to

do.

 

I think we were

just celebrating

being

alive.

 

that small room

full of smoke and

music and

voices,

night after night

after

night.

 

the poor, the mad,

the lost.

 

we lit up that hotel

with our twisted

souls

and it loved

us.

 

not much chance,

completely cut loose from

purpose,

he was a young man

riding a bus

through North Carolina

on the way to

somewhere

and it began to snow

and the bus stopped

at a little cafe

in the hills

and the passengers

entered.

 

he sat at the counter

with the others,

he ordered and the

food arrived.

the meal was

particularly

good

and the

coffee.

 

the waitress was

unlike the women

he had

known.

she was unaffected,

there was a natural

humor which came

from her.

the fry cook said

crazy things.

the dishwasher,

in back,

laughed, a good

clean

pleasant

laugh.

 

the young man watched

the snow through the

windows.

 

he wanted to stay

in that cafe

forever.

 

the curious feeling

swam through him

that everything

was

beautiful

there,

that it would always

stay beautiful

there.

 

then the bus driver

told the passengers

that it was time

to board.

 

the young man

thought, I’ll just sit

here, I’ll just stay

here.

 

but then

he rose and followed

the others into the

bus.

 

he found his seat

and looked at the cafe

through the bus

window.

then the bus moved

off, down a curve,

downward, out of

the hills.

 

the young man

looked straight

forward.

he heard the other

passengers

speaking

of other things,

or they were

reading

or

attempting to

sleep.

 

they had not

noticed

the

magic.

 

the young man

put his head to

one side,

closed his

eyes,

pretended to

sleep.

there was nothing

else to do—

just listen to the

sound of the

engine,

the sound of the

tires

in the

snow.

 

hey Chinaski:

    I am a filmmaker in the Hollywood area and

I am currently making a movie in which I

would like to include you.

    The nature of the movie is about an

alcoholic Satan who decides to leave hell

for a while and have a vacation in

Hollywood.

    This particular version of Satan is a fun

guy who can’t get enough booze, SLUTS,

or adventure.

    Satan, while in Hollywood looks up his

old buddies (Ghosts) Richard Burton,

Errol Flynn and Idi Amin (still alive).

He proceeds to get smashed with these

guys and they all pass out on him so

he needs to look up a mortal worthy of

drinking with him (YOU).

    The scene I have envisioned with you

would be to be sitting around a crummy

joint, drinking Mezcal and playing Russian

Roulette with Satan while 2 big fat chicks

are slapping each other with Salamis.

I would want everybody in the scene to be

SMASHED.

    I can tell you now that I couldn’t pay you

anything up front xcept Booze and

adventure.

    —However—

I am going to hopefully be able to release

this movie one day and would be happy to

work out a contractual agreement that

would arrange a royalty rate—(if you are

interested.)

    And thanks for mentioning in your

writing, KNUT HAMSUN.

he has turned out to be one of my

faves.

    And just remember,

WHEN IN DOUBT,

PASS OUT!