lost my first letter.

that would be the letter "a".
the only way that i now use this letter on my keyboard is by pasting it with ctrl+V.
seriously.
i don't know why i always have bad luck with things like this.
i don't "take good care" of all of my things, but i certainly don't trash them.

irrelevant.

i watched a documentary the other night about bukowski.
i have yet to read the man in depth. he's dirty and straight forward, and his poetry has no flourish, and his fiction is cold and poor and realistic. reminds me of the places selby has taken us. i didn't like the man, and i can't really say that i've found his genius yet. i only say yet because i know i'll find a line or two that unlocks a new image of him. something that makes me go back and reanalyze the things i'd written off. it's happened with dozens of records, and i'm almost positive it WILL happen with this author. i wait for it.

there was this one moment that i did completely connect with him on though, a moment that i know only too well, a moment that few people have seen, but people have seen. this is not my spotlight, though. he was reading a poem, one that found him in the shower with his version of her and she washed him. he reads this poem, and turns the page, reads a word or two and loses it, completely loses it. the kind of breakdown where you aren't sure if he's laughing or not. but he's not and you know he's not. he gets through the poem and he's rocked and he tries to play it off but he can't, he just can't.

i know that moment, that split-second,
that change of temperature, that feeling of her face between your palms,
that light in the room when you last saw her
and how it lights your blood up.

she's there and she will
always
be there.

he sums it up perfectly, and if i never understand the man's works, or never absorb the man's full repertoire, i can say that this is what i've taken from him and carried with me:

there are worse things than
being alone
but it often takes decades
to realize this
and most often
when you do
it's too late
and there's nothing worse
than
too late.




i'm trying to keep it
together lately, but
i've been someone else
entirely.