charles bukowski

i found myself getting irked the other day by coming across, again, bukowski described as the laureate of lowlife. i never really found hin so when i was younger - i liked a drink, had rubbish jobs, (still) love a day out at the horses - but i never considered myself a lowlife. and this before i started liking bukowski, a poetic 'i' seeming so excoriatingly honest compared to just about everyone else i knew in poetryland. and likewise, as i got older, i don't know anyone else who captures disappointment and loss quite so well. happy days then to discover these readings

predictably enough there's plenty in the comments that toher people shouldn't be reading, that their accent is wrong, that it doesn't sound 'lowlife' enough! one of these days i'd like to take a bunch of his later poems and have them read by older women, just to hear what that sounds like. you'd think it was a simple idea but poetry types don't like that sort of thing, not one bit.

all of which lead me to this guy and some hard spanish practice!