Something To Ponder...

10:45 a.m.


so I get up and go to the
bathroom,
throw water on my face,
look at that mug
so long ago abandoned by beauty; I
wince, gag, giggle.
heroically.

hero poet
hero man
hero friend
hero hero

hero lover
hero bather
hero

bullshitter.

young girls wearing nylons
and garter belts like their mothers
used to
would love watching me here, watering a
plant, putting one white egg
into a small pot of boiling water.
I walk over
put one finger on the greasy refrigerator
door, draw a horse,
put the number 9 on him as
the phone rings
rings
rings
I lift it and say, "yes?"
fear bounding up and down my arms,
I don't want to see any of them,
I don't want to hear from them, they should
all vanish forever.
what I need to protect me from them are
trenches, armies, the
blessing of a little luck.

"Hank?" says the voice, "how are you
doing?"

"o.k.," I say.

- Charles Bukowski