Mickey Rourke is one of my favorite 1980’s actors. When I saw him in the movie Barfly I thought his performance was mesmerizing. I had never heard of the real life poet and author he was playing a version of, Charles Bukowski. Several years later I came across Bukowski’s name again and a reference to Barfly, and decided to learn more about him. Bukowski lived from 1920 to 1994, much of that time in Los Angeles. He worked odd jobs, was a letter carrier for a while then a clerk at the post office. He wrote poetry on the side, getting published in avant garde magazines and by small presses. Eventually he gave riotous poetry readings and wrote a newspaper column. Black Sparrow Press gave him his big break, publishing his writing from 1969 on. I have read four of his novels and lost count of how many of his poetry collections I have enjoyed. Trying to sum up why I like reading him so much is hard, maybe because you have to admit you have enjoyed living vicariously in his slobby, drunken, violent, wasteland of a world. At the same time you are treated to such honesty, beauty, longing and tenderness in his writing that the contradictions almost seem impossible to be contained in the same man. He claimed he would have to wait for the muse to come to him and inspire his writing. “Don’t try,” was his advice on creativity. It is the epitaph on his tombstone.