The Circus of Death by Charles Bukowski
it’s there
from the beginning, to the middle, to the
end,
there from light to darkness,
there through the wasted
days and nights, through
the wasted years,
the continuance
of moving toward death.
sitting with death in your lap,
washing death out of your ears
and from between your toes,
talking to death, living with death while
living through the stained wall and the flat
tires
and the changing of the guard.
living with death in your stockings.
opening the morning blinds to death,
the circus of death,
the dancing girls of death,
the yellow teeth of death,
the cobra of death,
the deserts of death.
death like a tennis ball in the mouth of
a dog.
death while eating a candlelight dinner.
the roses of death.
death like a moth.
death like an empty shoe.
death the dentist.
through darkness and light and
laughter,
through the painting of a
masterpeice,
through the applause for the bowing
actors,
while taking
a walk through Paris,
by the broken-winged
bluebird,
while
glory
runs through your fingers as
you
pick up an orange.
through the bottom of the sky
divided into sections like a
watermelon
it
bellows
silently,
consumes nations and nations,
squirrels, fleas, hogs,
dandelions,
grandmothers, babies,
statues,
philosophies,
groundhogs,
the bullfighter, the bull and
all those killers in the
stadium.
it’s Plato and the murderer of a
child.
the eyes in your head.
your fingernails.
it’s amazing, amazing, amazing.
we’re clearly at the edge.
it’s thunder in a snail’s shell.
it’s the red mark on the black widow.
the the mirrow without a reflection.
it’s the singular viewpoint.
it’s the fog over Corpus Christi.
it’s in the eye of the hen.
it’s on the back of the turtle.
it’s moving at the sun
as you put your shoes on for the last
time
without
knowing it.
