The Last Night of the Earth Poems Read Online Free PDF Page B

everybody
    snoring
    at once
    and some of those
    snores
    so
    deep and
    gross and
    unbelievable—
    dark
    snotty
    gross
    subhuman
    wheezings
    from hell
    itself.
 
    your mind
    almost breaks
    under those
    death-like
    sounds
 
    and the
    intermingling
    odors:
    hard
    unwashed socks
    pissed and
    shitted
    underwear
 
    and over it all
    slowly circulating
    air
    much like that
    emanating from
    uncovered
    garbage
    cans.
 
    and those
    bodies
    in the dark
 
    fat and
    thin
    and
    bent
 
    some
    legless
    armless
 
    some
    mindless
 
    and worst of
    all:
    the total
    absence of
    hope
 
    it shrouds
    them
    covers them
    totally.
    it’s not
    bearable.
 
    you get
    up
 
    go out
 
    walk the
    streets
 
    up and
    down
    sidewalks
 
    past buildings
 
    around the
    corner
 
    and back
    up
    the same
    street
 
    thinking
 
    those men
    were all
    children
    once
 
    what has happened
    to
    them?
 
    and what has
    happened
    to
    me?
    it’s dark
    and cold
    out
    here.

hand-outs
     
     
    sometimes I am hit
    for change
    3 or 4 times
    in twenty minutes
    and nine times out of
    ten I’ll
    give.
    the time or two
    that I don’t
    I have an instinctive
    reaction
    not to
    and I
    don’t
    but mostly I
    dig and
    give
    but each time
    I can’t help but
    remember
    the many times
    hollow-eyed
    my skin tight to the
    ribs
    my mind airy and
    mad
    I never asked
    anybody
    for anything
    and it wasn’t
    pride
    it was simply because
    I didn’t respect
    them
    didn’t regard them
    as worthy human
    beings.
    they were the
    enemy
    and they still are
    as I dig
    in
    and
    give.

waiting
     
     
    hot summers in the mid-30’s in Los Angeles
    where every 3rd lot was vacant
    and it was a short ride to the orange
    groves—
    if you had a car and the
    gas.
 
    hot summers in the mid-30’s in Los Angeles
    too young to be a man and too old to
    be a boy.
 
    hard times.
    a neighbor tried to rob our
    house, my father caught him
    climbing through the
    window,
    held him there in the dark
    on the floor:
    “you rotten son of a
    bitch!”
 
    “Henry, Henry, let me go,
    let me go!”
 
    “you son of a bitch, I’ll kill
    you!”
 
    my mother phoned the police.
 
    another neighbor set his house on fire
    in an attempt to collect the
    insurance.
    he was investigated and
    jailed.
 
    hot summers in the mid-30’s in Los Angeles,
    nothing to do, nowhere to go, listening to
    the terrified talk of our parents
    at night:
    “what will we do? what will we
    do?”
 
    “god, I don’t know…”
 
    starving dogs in the alleys, skin taut
    across ribs, hair falling out, tongues
    out, such sad eyes, sadder than any sadness
    on earth.
 
    hot summers in the mid-30’s in Los Angeles,
    the men of the neighborhood were quiet
    and the women were like pale
    statues.
 
    the parks full of socialists,
    communists, anarchists, standing on the park
    benches, orating, agitating.
 
    the sun came down through a clear sky and
    the ocean was clean
    and we were
    neither men nor
    boys.
 
    we fed the dogs leftover pieces of dry hard
    bread
    which they ate gratefully,
    eyes shining in
    wonder,
    tails waving at such
    luck
 
    as
    World War II moved toward us,
    even then, during those
    hot summers in the mid-30’s in Los Angeles.

those mornings
     
     
    I still remember those New Orleans rats
    out on the balcony railings
    in the dark of early morning
    as I stood waiting my turn at the
    crapper.
    there were always two or three
    big ones
    just sitting there—sometimes they’d
    move quickly then
    stop and sit there.
    I looked at them and they looked at
    me.
    they showed no fear.
 
    at last the crapper door would open
    and out would walk
    one of the tenants
    and he always looked worse than
    the rats
    and then he’d be gone
    down the hallway
    and I’d go into the still-stinking
    crapper
    with my hangover.
 
    and almost always
    when I came out
    the rats would be gone.
    as soon as it got a little light
    they would
    vanish.
 
    and then
    the world would be
    mine,
    I’d walk down the stairway
    and into it
    and my