"I'm not going to let anybody see you"

December 7, 2023 2:50 PM

'Bluebird' by Charles Bukowski. (slyt)
posted by clavdivs (7 comments total)

Hadn't seen that one before.

My favorite reading of that poem is by Harry Dean Stanton.

A block from me there's a bar called The Bluebird. I always assumed it was named after this poem. Finally, I asked the owner. She'd never heard of it.
posted by dobbs at 2:59 PM on December 7, 2023 [7 favorites]

yesterday I was watching bluebirds on my break trying to prevent other birds from the feeder. how Cardinal waits patiently when the woodpecker jutes in, harmony in 3:12.

yea, I've come late to bukowski. have a little short list of videos and the Harry Dean one was near the top and this one was released today.
posted by clavdivs at 3:16 PM on December 7, 2023 [3 favorites]

yea, I've come late to bukowski.

If you come early to bukowski you die of alcoholism before you're 40.
posted by hippybear at 3:55 PM on December 7, 2023 [14 favorites]

perhaps you're thinking of Shelley. I have no doubt bukowski might blow up a tree stump with gunpowder, but the occult?
posted by clavdivs at 4:36 PM on December 7, 2023 [2 favorites]

One of his best. Works great on its own. Works even better if you know his reputation (which was, for the most part, well-earned; he was a wreck of a person and often abusive).
posted by asnider at 9:14 AM on December 8, 2023 [2 favorites]

A very good reading. Thank you for this one, clavdivs.
And thanks for that one, too, Dobbs: faster, more aggressive.

(looks fondly at his Black Sparrow stack)
posted by doctornemo at 12:03 PM on December 8, 2023 [1 favorite]

My main lesson from Charles Bukowski is to listen to lots of Gustave Mahler, especially the slow symphonies.
posted by Narrative_Historian at 11:45 PM on December 10, 2023 [1 favorite]