I laugh sometimes when I think about <br />say <br />Céline at a typewriter <br />or Dostoevsky... <br />or Hamsun... <br />ordinary men with feet, ears, eyes, <br />ordinary men with hair on their heads <br />sitting there typing words <br />while having difficulties with life <br />while being puzzled almost to madness. <br /> <br />Dostoevsky gets up <br />he leaves the machine to piss, <br />comes back <br />drinks a glass of milk and thinks about <br />the casino and <br />the roulette wheel. <br /> <br />Céline stops, gets up, walks to the <br />window, looks out, thinks, my last patient <br />died today, I won't have to make any more <br />visits there. <br />when I saw him last <br />he paid his doctor bill; <br />it's those who don't pay their bills, <br />they live on and on. <br />Céline walks back, sits down at the <br />machine <br />is still for a good two minutes <br />then begins to type. <br /> <br />Hamsun stands over his machine thinking, <br />I wonder if they are going to believe <br />all these things I write? <br />he sits down, begins to type. <br />he doesn't know what a writer's block <br />is: <br />he's a prolific son-of-a-bitch <br />damn near as magnificent as <br />the sun. <br />he types away. <br /> <br />and I laugh <br />not out loud <br />but all up and down these walls, these <br />dirty yellow and blue walls <br />my white cat asleep on the <br />table <br />hiding his eyes from the <br />light. <br /> <br />he's not alone tonight <br />and neither am <br />I.<br /><br />Charles Bukowski<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/one-thirty-six-a-m/
