Odd by Charles Bukowski
some nights
like this night
seem to crawl down the back of one’s
neck and settle at the base of the skull,
stay there
like that
like this.
it is probably a little prelude to
death,
a warm-up.
I accept.
then the mind becomes like a
movie:
I watch Doestoevsky in a small room
and he is drinking a glass of
milk.
it is not a long movie:
he puts the glass down and it
ends.
then I am back
here.
an air purifier
makes its soft sound behind me.
I smoke too much, the whole room
often turns blue
so now my wife has put in the air purifier.
now the night has left the back
of my skull.
I lean back in the swivel
chair
pick up a bottle opener shaped
like a horse.
it’s like I’m holding the whole world
here
shaped like a horse.
I put the world down,
open a paper clip and begin to clean
my fingernails.
waiting on death can be perfectly
peaceful.
