"Чарльз Буковски. Дневник последних лет жизни (engl)" - читать интересную книгу автора

I don't know what to do about the racetrack. I think it's burning out
for me. I was standing around at Hollywood Park today, inter-track betting,
13 races from Fairplex Park. After the 7th race I am $72 ahead. So? Will it
take some of those white hairs out of my eyebrows? Will it make and opera
singer out of me? What do I want? I am beating a difficult game, I am
beating an 18 take. I do that quite a bit. I do that quite a bit. So, it
mustn't be too difficult. What do I want? I really don't care if there is
God or not. It doesn't interest me. So, what the hell is it about 18
percent?
I look over and see the same guy talking. He stands in the same spot
every day talking to this person or that or to a couple of people. He holds
the Form and talks about the horses. How dreary! What am I doing here?
I leave. I walk down to parking, get in my car and drive off. It's only
4 p.m. How nice. I drive along. Others drive along. We are snails crawling
on a leaf.
Then I get into the driveway, park, get out. There's a message from
Linda taped to the phone. I check the mail. Gas bill. And a large envelope
full of poems. All printed on separate pieces of paper. Women talking about
their periods, about their tits and breasts and about getting fucked.
Utterly dull. I dump it in the trash.
The I take a dump. Feel better. Take off my clothes and step into the
pool. Ice water. But great. I walk along toward the deep end of the pool,
the water rising inch by inch, chilling me. Then I plunge below the water.
It's restful. The world doesn't know where I am. I come up, swim to the far
edge, find the ledge, sit there. It must be about the 9th or 10th race. The
horses are stil running. I plunge of my age hanging onto me like a leech.
Still, it's o.k. I should have been dead 40 years ago. I rise to the top,
swim to the far edge, get out.
That was a long time ago. I'm up here now with the Macintosh IIsi. And
this is about all there is for now. I think I'll sleep. Rest up for the
track tomorrow.

9/26/91 12:16 AM
Got the proofs the new book today. Poetry. Martin says it will run to
about 350 pages. I think the poems hold up. Uphold. I am an old train
steaming down the track.
Took me a couple of hours to read. I've had some practice at doing this
thing. The lines roll free and say about what I want them to say. Now the
main influence on myself is myself.
As we live we all get caught and torn by various traps. Nobody escapes
them. Some even live with them. The idea is to realize that a trap is a
trap. If you are in one nad you don't realize it, then you're finished. I
believe that I have recognized most of my traps and I have written about
them. Of course, all of writing doesn't consist of writing about traps.
There are other things. Yet, some might say that life is a trap. Writing can
trap. Some writers tend to write what has pleased their readers in the past.
Then they are finished. Most writers' creative span is short. They hear the
accolades and believe them. There is only one final judge of writing and
that is the writer. When he is swayed by the critics, the editors, the
publishers, the readers, then he's finished. And, of course, when he's