In the betting line the other
day
man behind me asked,
“are you Henry
Chinaski?”

these things that we support most
have nothing to do with up,
and we do with them
out of boredom or fear or money
or cracked intelligence;

I am a panther shut up and bellowi
cement walls, and I am angry at bl
evenings without ventilation
and I am angry with you, and it wi
like a rose

the wind blows hard tonight
and it’s a cold wind
and I think about
the boys on the row.
I hope some of them have a bottle

once
we were young
at this
machine. . .
drinking

I met a genius on the train
today
about 6 years old,
he sat beside me
and as the train

Sunday, I am eating a
grapefruit, church is over at the
Orthadox to the
west.
she is dark

the night I was going to die
I was sweating on the bed
and I could hear the crickets
and there was a cat fight outside
and I could feel my soul dropping

They don’t make it
the beautiful die in flame—
suicide pills, rat poison, rope wh
ever...
they rip their arms off,

this fear of being what they are:
dead.
at least they are not out on the s
are careful to stay indoors, those
pasty mad who sit alone before the