Sunday, February 04, 2007

Is There Balm in Gilead?...or Bukowski?



so you want to be a writer?

Charles Bukowski


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.


------------------------------------------------------
From sifting through the madness for the Word, the line, the way by Charles Bukowski. © 2003 - Harper Collins

6 comments:

Brian Campbell said...

A good thought-provoking poem. I adore Bukowski. Thanks for sharing it. But call me boring and pretentious, I don't agree with it. We are still capable of surprising ourselves, even when we "feel" most flat.

Nick said...

Brian, this poem (as conceited as the speaker's voice appears to be) has a cathartic effect on me when I am in doubt as to whether I should be writing or not.

Re: We are still capable of surprising ourselves, even when we "feel" most flat.

Yes, agreed, even a broken clock tells the right time twice a day.

Suzanne said...

I've always read this poem as more of warning or a note of caution. This writing stuff is nuts. ;-)

Nick said...

Re:This writing stuff is nuts. ;-)

I'm still trying to figure if I have the "write stuff".

Brian Campbell said...

With a little water, seeds in the dryest desert ground can sprout. Even around broken clocks. (Pls. excuse my obnoxious tendency to always try to get in that witty last word... tick tock talk...) ;-)

Nick said...

How Daliesque - a broken clock in a desert!

Re:Pls. excuse my obnoxious tendency to always try to get in that witty last word...

Wittle away... :-)