on “Absence of the Hero,” good it went, it started as a very long matter but each time I read it I saw another line or another paragraph that didn’t belong. I don’t have a copy of the thing around so no longer know what I wrote. but, as I was writing the thing I had this idea that I was processing something down to where it BELONGED. it gets very slippery sometimes, and there you go over the EDGE, but I finally chopped it down to where I wanted it, and I knew I had what I wanted but I had to worry about you—there was a chance you might think that I was just throwing cold gravy out the window. it was not so. I fought the fucking thing all the way through like an octopus with an embracing pussy. so, I’m happy you picked up on the vibe strings. it’s paranoia-reality; first one is one, the other the other; then they mix; everything become the same. when Evergreen #70 comes out—at least the proofs read #70—my job is over at the post office. I exposed all their little interrogations in dark rooms under their human-skin lamps (America, the beautiful!) about how they didn’t care for the type of thing that I wrote while drawing their bloody and sweaty paychecks. of course, other things in there too. it runs quite long and is mostly comedy, like dying. I’ll ship you a copy. you say so.

[* * *] I haven’t eaten in 3 or 4 days, but that’s nothing new with me. I still weigh around 220. was once down to 133. it’s really much better to be light—for fucking, bumming, swimming, almost anything else. I guess the only edge a heavy man has is shitting—man, there’s nothing like a heavy pooping fat stinking beershit your cheeks spread all over the silly bowl; looking down at your toes, cutting it loose! glory! then to get up and ADMIRE YOUR OWN TURDS! AH, SO MANY OF THEM! WHAT A GREAT MAN I MUST REALLY BE TO BE SO FULL OF SHIT!?!

strange thing—3 critical studies of me arrived in the mail in about two days. one a long book, another an article in a sex mag, another some burblings about me in a thing called A Bukowski Sampler. really, the worst one was the one by the prof, the long book—he just went on winding-out the spool of literary criticism as he had been taught to do. and to make it more cajoling complete—he called the worst poems the best ones, the best ones the worst, and very bothered with the term “surrealism,” I guess something they really jammed into his anus in college. the one in the sex mag was really the best; I got drunk with the guy all night one night so he had something to talk about that I told him instead of something he imagined through reading my crap. after getting a ph.d. you know? well, the Sampler thing was all mixed-up. they meant well, but, basically, they were too young and not enough had happened to them. I don’t mean that you have to be OLD to write, but I do mean that if you are OLD and can still write and have sailed some bloody ships, you’re got a little edge. [* * *]