The libraries of the world have yawned themselves to sleep over your kind -- don't add to that.

[raybear]

Today I'm all about other people's words, instead of my own.



so you want to be a writer?

if it doesn't come bursting out of you
in spite of everything,
don't do it.
unless it comes unasked out of your
heart and your mind and your mouth
and your gut,
don't do it.
if you have to sit for hours
staring at your computer screen
or hunched over your
typewriter
searching for words,
don't do it.
if you're doing it for money or
fame,
don't do it.
if you're doing it because you want
women in your bed,
don't do it.
if you have to sit there and
rewrite it again and again,
don't do it.
if it's hard work just thinking about doing it,
don't do it.
if you're trying to write like somebody
else,
forget about it.

if you have to wait for it to roar out of
you,
then wait patiently.
if it never does roar out of you,
do something else.
if you first have to read it to your wife
or your girlfriend or your boyfriend
or your parents or to anybody at all,
you're not ready.

don't be like so many writers,
don't be like so many thousands of
people who call themselves writers,
don't be dull and boring and
pretentious, don't be consumed with self-
love.
the libraries of the world have
yawned themselves to
sleep
over your kind.
don't add to that.
don't do it.
unless it comes out of
your soul like a rocket,
unless being still would
drive you to madness or
suicide or murder,
don't do it.
unless the sun inside you is
burning your gut,
don't do it.

when it is truly time,
and if you have been chosen,
it will do it by
itself and it will keep on doing it
until you die or it dies in
you.

there is no other way.

and there never was.

- charles bukowski


I'm not Bukowski's biggest fan, but I read this piece in New Orleans for the first time a couple months ago, and it popped in my head this morning.

Comments

[saltjam.livejournal.com]

you know, i have this secret little like for bukowski. (ha, notice how i didn't say love...i'm too afraid!) i try not to say it around others cuz than i hear the tirades. i know, i know, i know,....

but sometimes he just writes that "at the bottom" shit and it doesn't sound pathetic. it can sound amazing.

that poem actually makes me feel better cuz I do write in insane productive bursts and then i won't at all and feel like i'm a "fake" writer or whatever. but the bursts always come back. it's just the time in between that makes me feel insecure.

[saltjam.livejournal.com]

horribly short notice. if you and dommeyourass (or either of you) wanna come see Kinsey at Piper's Alley at 9:15pm I'll be there with some folks.