I can remember starving in a <br />small room in a strange city <br />shades pulled down, listening to <br />classical music <br />I was young I was so young it hurt like a knife <br />inside <br />because there was no alternative except to hide as long <br />as possible-- <br />not in self-pity but with dismay at my limited chance: <br />trying to connect. <br /> <br />the old composers -- Mozart, Bach, Beethoven, <br />Brahms were the only ones who spoke to me and <br />they were dead. <br /> <br />finally, starved and beaten, I had to go into <br />the streets to be interviewed for low-paying and <br />monotonous <br />jobs <br />by strange men behind desks <br />men without eyes men without faces <br />who would take away my hours <br />break them <br />piss on them. <br /> <br />now I work for the editors the readers the <br />critics <br /> <br />but still hang around and drink with <br />Mozart, Bach, Brahms and the <br />Bee <br />some buddies <br />some men <br />sometimes all we need to be able to continue alone <br />are the dead <br />rattling the walls <br />that close us in. <br /> <br /> <br />Anonymous submission.<br /><br />Charles Bukowski<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/friends-within-the-darkness/
