I was only a student

all the women
all their kisses the
different ways they love and
talk and need.

their ears they all have
ears and
throats and dresses
and shoes and
automobiles and ex-
husbands.

mostly
the women are very
warm they remind me of
buttered toast with the butter
melted
in.

there is a look in the
eye: they have been
taken they have been
fooled. I don’t quite know what to
do for
them.

I am
a fair cook a good
listener
but I never learned to
dance — I was busy
then with larger things.

but I’ve enjoyed their different
beds
smoking cigarettes
staring at the
ceilings. I was neither vicious nor
unfair. only
a student.

I know they all have these
feet and barefoot they go across the floor as
I watch their bashful buttocks in the
dark. I know that they like me, some even
love me
but I love very
few.

some give me orange and vitamin pills;
others talk very quietly of
childhood and fathers and
landscapes; some are almost
crazy but none of them are without
meaning; some love
well, others not
so; the best at sex are not always the
best in other
ways; each has limits as I have
limits and we learn
each other
quickly.

all the women all the
women all the
bedrooms
the rugs the
photos the
curtains, it’s
something like a church only
at times there’s
laughter.

those ears those
arms those
elbows those eyes
looking, the fondness and
the wanting I have been
held have been
held.


Charles Bukowski

pindaro