Buk off
I work in a bookshop, ok? Nerdy? Yes. Infinite knowledge? No.
So, when you work in a bookshop and you buy a book in your own shop, you get judged. I now feel the eyes questioning me when I buy poetry, like I have to justify it. Well, I don’t. It is what it is…….words. That’s all.
They also assume, when you buy any Charles Bukowski stuff, that you harbor secret dreams of abusing women and drinking yourself to death. Also not true. Anyone who has ever delved a little bit deeper into Bukowski’s poetry will tell you the same.
The man helped me recognise the answer to one of the biggest questions hidden in my psyche.
That is…..that there is NO secret. To anything. There are no beautiful people etc. I discovered this on a train to my parent’s house one afternoon after reading Buk’s poem ‘The secret’. I felt broken hearted yet enlightened.
It is true that a lot of his prose, fiction and poetry is chauvinistic but I urge you to give it a go. If nothing else, you will never forget it.
