last year i resolved to take part in more Poetry Fridays….
sounds like a plan!
i found this wonderful, wonderful bit of animation inspired by a Bukowski poem drawn by Monika Umba. the images just sing. the bird cage/rib cage is lovely, the emptiness that really is so full. (here’s a link to the original post at Brain Pickings; it’s pretty too!)
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=jsc3ItAKSLc]
but here’s another good one.
“Beans with Garlic” by Charles Bukowski
this is important enough:
to get your feelings down,
it is better than shaving
or cooking beans with garlic.
it is the little we can do
this small bravery of knowledge
and there is of course
madness and terror too
in knowing
that some part of you
wound up like a clock
can never be wound again
once it stops.
but now
there’s a ticking under your shirt
and you whirl the beans with a spoon,
one love dead, one love departed
another love…
ah! as many loves as beans
yes, count them now
sad, sad
your feelings boiling over flame,
get this down.
What wonderful poems to share. Those first two lines are quite a beginning. I had to read the poem several times to try to understand. It seems so sad, but the person is okay too. Thanks!
Not often that you see the softer side of Bukowski. Thanks for sharing these. That video is quite striking. -Ed
That animation is lovely! And I like the other Bukowski poem, too. So bittersweet. “as many loves as beans” — that made me smile. I’m glad you participated in Poetry Friday this week.
What a great video…and the poem is so full of pain and love and the job of living.