John-Ward Leighton

REMEMBERING HANK

Charles Bukowski

For many years, friends, when reading my poetry,
said they thought my work was a lot like
Charles Bukowski’s work.
In my poets conceit
I avoided reading
Hanks work
until, whilst browsing,
in the Granville book company
a place deep in memory
that no longer exists
I came upon
“Love is a dog from hell”
and I bought the book
because the title
paraphrased a line from
one of my poems.

Having been down Alcohol Road myself
Hank’s poetry spoke to me.
His seemingly callous facade
didn’t fool me for a minute
I knew there was a wounded
soul within
and when he was at his most outrageous
he amused me no end.

I’ll close for now
and go back to the well thumbed pages
of that first book
and be
remembering Hank.

©Copyright October 10, 2008 by John-Ward Leighton