3 Erotic Poems

BY: PROVOKR Staff

Although he’s often referred to as the “Dirty Old Man of American Letters,” Charles Bukowski also had a vulnerable side. In On Love, a new anthology of his work, Bukowski’s typically gritty style is in full view, but given the subjects at hand—lust, sex, neediness, loneliness and the fragility of human relationships—the poet’s softer side emerges as well. The following three poems from the collection illustrate how deeply Bukowski pondered his relationships (coital and otherwise) with women and how they all left their marks.

 

have you ever kissed a panther?

this woman thinks she’s a panther

and sometimes when we are making love

she’ll snarl and spit

and her hair comes down

and she looks out from the strands

and shows me her fangs

but I kiss her anyhow and continue to love.

have you ever kissed a panther?

have you ever seen a female panther enjoying

the act of love?

you haven’t loved, friend.

you with your little dyed blondes

you with your squirrels and chipmunks

and elephants and sheep.

you ought to sleep with a panther

you’ll never again want

squirrels, chipmunks, elephants, sheep, fox,

wolverines,

never anything but the female panther

the female panther walking across the room

the female panther walking across your soul;

all other love songs are lies

when that black smooth fur moves against you

and the sky falls down against your back,

the female panther is the dream arrived real

and there’s no going back

or wanting to—

the fur up against you,

the search is over

as your cock moves against the edge of Nirvana

and you are locked against the eyes of a panther.

From ON LOVE by Charles Bukowski. Copyright ©2016 by Linda Lee Bukowski. Reprinted courtesy of Ecco, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.

 

for those 3

going crazy

sitting around listening to Chopin

waltzes, having slept with 3 different women

in 3 different states

in two weeks, the pace has been

difficult, sitting in airport bars

holding hands with beautiful ladies

who had read Tolstoy, Turgenev and

Bukowski.

amazing how completely a lady can give her love—when she wants

to.

now the ladies are far away

and I sit here barefooted

unshaven, drinking beer and listening to these Chopin

waltzes, and

thinking of each of the ladies

and I wonder if they think of me

or am I just a book of poems

lost in with other books of poems?

lost in with Turgenev and Tolstoy.

no matter. they have enough.

when they touch my book now

they will know the shape of my body

they will know my laughter and my love and

my sadness.

my thanks.

From ON LOVE by Charles Bukowski. Copyright ©2016 by Linda Lee Bukowski. Reprinted courtesy of Ecco, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.

 

a love poem for all the women I have known

all the women

all their kisses the

different way 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 know quite what to do for

them.

I am

a fair cook a good

listener

but I have 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 oranges and pills;

others talk 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 waiting I have been

held I have been

held.

From ON LOVE by Charles Bukowski. Copyright ©2016 by Linda Lee Bukowski. Reprinted courtesy of Ecco, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.