Buk quote about only amateurs drinking at New Year's Eve?

[HankD]

Where have I seen this, Bukowski goes on about New Year's Eve being
only for amateur drinkers...? Is it a poem? Anyone knows?
I couldn't find it in any database. What do you say, it really sounds like
coming from a Buk poem and since I agree and want to use it
I need to check it out. Ha!
---Hank

 

[ROC]

In a 1966 letter to Ann Menebroker, he writes;
"Xmas season is when the populace really becomes beastly. they cram and run and flurry wild and mama empty-eyed; me, me, I got! we got! my family! safe! goods! roof! food! a drink in hand! whoopee! - what sickening stuff. it's pressure and haste, a MUST. nothing easy or good about it.
then ... HAPPY NEW YEAR.
uggg."

 

[ROC]

but you would mean;

12-24-78

I suck on this beer
in my kitchen
and think about
cleaning my fingernails
and shaving
as I listen to the
classical radio
station.
they play holiday
music.
I prefer to hear Christmas
music in July
while I am being threatened
with death by
a woman.
that's
when I need it -
that's when I need
Bing Crosby and the
elves and
some fast
reindeer

now I sit here
listening to this
slop in
season - it's such
a sugar tit -
I'd rather play a game of
ping-pong with
the risen ghost
of Hitler.

amatuer drunks run their cheerful
cars into each other
the ambulances sing to each
other outside.

 

[Rekrab]

My way of celebrating New Years is to hit the hay well before midnight and ride it out asleep. I like Buk's line about "some fast raindeer."

 

[Paul Sempschi]

Happy Hang Over Day

A buddy of mine always said that New Year's Day is the only day where it's acceptable, if not enjoyable to have a hangover. Not that it's a great revelation but when we all are puking our guts up, watching "Pee Wee Herman" and "The Big Lebowski" (easy watching) we can all laugh at each other's misery.
This year was strange because none of us guys could get drunk. Me and a buddy shared four bottles of schnapps (at 28%) and I only got buzzed. He kept bitching about not even having that. Four other people drinking beer with nothing. But what was strange was our dates got loaded off of minimal intake. For example, another guy's girl had two coolers (Smirnoff) and was completely floored, snorting and stumbling around- like a child, crying out of frustration.
"You goddamned bitch," he yelled at her, "you sucked up all my drunk!" and all that. No hangovers that morn.

 

[cheap gin]

Hey Buk where did that poem come from? I'm not much of a poetry guy and have thus far stuck to Bukowski's prose, but I was looking over some of his poetry in the bookstore this afternoon and have been thinking about taking the plunge.

I just love the way Bukowski keeps surprising me (ah, to be young and in love). My thoughts exactly regarding New Year's Eve and drinkers. Actually, I'd go further and say weekend drinkers are amateurs as well. I mean sitting in the bar on a weeknight is so much more pleasant to me giving that the crowd is different. These people are there for a reason, to drink. On the weekends and New Year's eve, those people show up in their finery looking for attention, partying, whatever. Very few seem to want what the bar is really offering, redemption at the bottum of a bottle. Maybe not redemption, but maybe solace? Or at least a brief moment of escape.

Worst part is feeling like a stranger in my own home. This last New Year's Eve I stopped in for a couple of beers in jeans and a sweatshirt, only to sit next to a horde of freshly laundered and coifed strangers I'll never see again. And I had to fight for a stool.

 

[the only good poet]

Hey Buk where did that poem come from?

the collection PLAY THE PIANO DRUNK LIKE A PERCUSSION INSTRUMENT UNTIL THE FINGERS BEGIN TO BLEED A BIT

"to ignore christmas takes a special wisdom
but happy New Year to
you all."

from the collection, What Matters Most... (p121,123)

 

[the only good poet]

My thoughts exactly regarding New Year's Eve and drinkers. Actually, I'd go further and say weekend drinkers are amateurs as well. I mean sitting in the bar on a weeknight is so much more pleasant to me giving that the crowd is different. These people are there for a reason, to drink. On the weekends and New Year's eve, those people show up in their finery looking for attention, partying, whatever. Very few seem to want what the bar is really offering, redemption at the bottum of a bottle. Maybe not redemption, but maybe solace? Or at least a brief moment of escape.

Worst part is feeling like a stranger in my own home. This last New Year's Eve I stopped in for a couple of beers in jeans and a sweatshirt, only to sit next to a horde of freshly laundered and coifed strangers I'll never see again. And I had to fight for a stool.

i think what you say here is spot on! not that i've had a bar as a home in a few years...

 

[cheap gin]

the collection PLAY THE PIANO DRUNK LIKE A PERCUSSION INSTRUMENT UNTIL THE FINGERS BEGIN TO BLEED A BIT

"to ignore christmas takes a special wisdom
but happy New Year to
you all."

from the collection, What Matters Most... (p121,123)

Thanks much, I saw that on the poetry shelves at the local bookstore but didn't pick it up. I almost went with SLOUCHING TOWARD NIRVANA, for what I would like to ostensibly say was inspiration and a desire to jump in at the end and work backward. Truth is, though, the title just kept drawing me in. Shallow, I know, but figured anywhere was about the same for me starting.

I think I might try the PIANO. Seems as good a place as any to start.

Thanks again.

 

[the only good poet]

I think I might try the PIANO. Seems as good a place as any to start.

i believe it's best to start with the stuff published in his lifetime, which Piano was. some of the postumous stuff is retrograde b, and i believe was only brought out as there would be no more. that said, even a bad bukowski poem can be entertaining. i read first THE LAST NIGHT OF THE EARTH POEMS. the last to be published during his lifetime, he had thoroughly mastered his craft, and it shows.

 

[Bukfan]

THE LAST NIGHT... is one of my favourites. Probably the best of his later books of poems...as for the posthumous stuff you're right. It's weak compared to the poems published while he was still alive. However, there are a few good poems here and there, but it's certainly not the place to start for a newcomer to Buk...

 

[cheap gin]

Thanks poetista and Bukfan...I am currently working through LAST NIGHT and find it truly enjoyable and reflective of some of my own thinking, just much better written. I particularly feel his frustration and insightful dissection of the little, often overlooked elements of life. I know there may be more regarded works in the book, but I find "the telephone," his exasperation of one of the modern "convienences" of life as merely an anoyance and intrusion (or rather a vehicle for such), to be so inciteful and personal to me.

Thanks again, and while I did peruse Piano, I think LAST NIGHT is a better staring point for me.

 

[reasonknot]

this ship is drowning me out of my gourd