[To Tom McNamara]

Late May [1965]

got the Journal Unamerican and enclosed buck for next 5 issues. this pb. just zany enough to bug-gas us all. comic strip best of all—“Mr. Hurts,” my god!

you didn’t let me know you were starting a mag. I will make some attempt to submit but am pretty burned-out after hurling together Crucifix. look, if you tell Webb-1109 Royal St., New Orleans…or Lyle Stuart 239 Park Ave South, New York, 3—you are going to review the book, I’m sure you’ll get a copy. Or why don’t you walk in on Stuart, wave this letter at him and tell him you are the editor of The Journal Un/American and emanon and demand a copy of Crucifix. this would be much more dramatic! Stuart runs a pretty good liberal paper himself.

this is late may 1965 and I have not yet killed myself although I fell down drunk in the bathroom last night and vomited over myself, I, Charles Bukowski, mad poet, fuck, and asshole. I was once married to this millionairess who had to let me go mainly because she couldn’t understand me. “You’re always laughing at yourself, demeaning yourself. I like a man who likes himself.” well, that’s all right too, only we are all crazy in our different ways.

working into the 2nd 6 pack now and a pint of CUTTY sits on the shelf. I intended to go to work tonight but this woman and child don’t seem to be worrying about $ or rent or survival so why in the hell should I? sometimes it’s just not the night to go in and if you do go in that night you are dead, you know what I mean. our man Blazek having money trouble now, and how any of us survive—what sweet hell, what a going on! my trouble is that I don’t know how to do anything but get drunk and write poems, and often the poems are not what they should be. can I hand the landlord a poem for the rent? I’m fucked, we’re all fucked, we don’t stand a chance. I might get some green with a novel but I still don’t feel like writing a novel, may never write one, and so there goes that. It’s terrible just to try to stay alive and not quite know why. just to eat a little and wipe the ass and stare at a lightbulb. the gophers and worms are foxy;—they stand in line with my last rejection.

Steve Richmond says he gets letters from you. what ya trying to do, Mac?—wake us all up?

[To Al Purdy]

Late May, 1965

I do not write too often because I do want to keep it easy and not let it be a drag. I am engaged in writing several young literary fellows right now and my balls are dragging. you know—everything’s new to them: life’s a drag, life’s horror, life’s anything but writing a poem; life’s more like talking about writing a poem and clutching hands. well, shit, maybe I am a little hard on the boys, and some of their letters are good but it does become a merry-go-round. [* * *]