The Difference Between Art And Life Is

Christmas Poem To A Man In Jail Hello Bill Abbott: I Appreciate Your Passing Around My Books In Jail There, My Poems And Stories. If I Can Lighten The Load For Some Of Those Guys With My Books, Fine. But Literature, You Know, Is Difficult For The Average Man To Assimilate (and For The Unaverage Man Too); I Don't Like Most Poetry, For Example, So I Write Mine The Way I Like To Read It.

Thanksgiving. It Proved You Had Survived Another Year With Its Wars, Inflation, Unemployment, Smog, Presidents. It Was A Grand Neurotic Gathering Of Clans: Loud Drunks, Grandmothers, Sisters, Aunts, Screaming Children, Would-be Suicides. And Don't Forget Indigestion. I Wasn't Different From Anyone Else: There Sat The 18-pound Bird On My Sink, Dead, Plucked, Totally Disemboweled. Iris Would Roast It For Me.

I Could See The Road Ahead Of Me. I Was Poor And I Was Going To Stay Poor. But I Didn't Particularly Want Money. I Didn't Know What I Wanted. Yes, I Did. I Wanted Someplace To Hide Out, Someplace Where One Didn't Have To Do Anything. The Thought Of Being Something Didn't Only Appall Me, It Sickened Me . . . To Do Things, To Be Part Of Family Picnics, Christmas, The 4th Of July, Labor Day, Mother's Day . . . Was A Man Born Just To Endure Those Things And Then Die? I Would Rather Be A Dishwasher, Return Alone To A Tiny Room And Drink Myself To Sleep.

There Is A Loneliness In This World So Great That You Can See It In The Slow Movement Of The Hands Of A Clock

Even The Stove And The Refrigerator Looked Human, I Mean Good Human - They Seemed To Have Arms And Voices And They Said, Hang Around, Kid, It's Good Here, It Can Be Very Good Here.