a non-urgent poem

By Charles Bukowski

I had this fellow write me that
he felt there wasn’t the
“urgency” in my poems
of the present
as compared to my poems
of the past.

now, if this is true
why did he write me
about it?
have I made his days
more
incomplete?
it’s
possible.

Well, I too have felt
let down
by writers
I once thought were
powerful
or
at least
very damned
good
but
I never considered
writing them to
inform them that I
sensed their
demise.
I found the best thing
I could do
was just to type away
at my own work
and let the dying
die
as they always
have.