"The Man with The Beautiful Eyes" Charles Bukowski poem analysis essay

"The Man with the Beautiful Eyes" Charles Bukowski, "The Last Night of the Earth Poems" (1992)

poem analysis essay _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________ INTRODUCTION

What you are about to read is an analysis essay about one of the most famous poem written by the german-american and godfather of the "dirty realism" Charles Bukowski; poem which in 1999, 5 years after Bukowski's death, was adapted in the homonym animated short film and published on October 17th 2000.

In this essay I'll analyze the poem and explain my ( personal ) interpetation of it, as I realized reading on the Internet, this poem although very popular is often overlooked and not well understood. Most important, since this is an analysis, I'm asuming you've already read the poetry altough I'll quote some paragraph to go more in detail.

Before going further, I must precise English is not my mother language, so I apologize for any possible grammatical mistakes I might not have noticed and corrected. _________________________________________________________

The poetry takes a place during Bukowski's childhood, and tells the story about a "strange" house in which yard Charles and his friends used to play.

The house seems apparently abandoned as: "all the shades were always drawn and we never heard voices in there" The house's yard is full of bamboo, and Charles and his friends like to play pretending to be Tarzan "(although there was no Jane)." (Hinting there was no girl in the group), and feed goldfish in a fish pond.

In the next verse we find out the kids have been playing there because mere curiosity. our parents had

told us: “never go near that house.” so, of course, we went. we wondered if anybody lived there.

And this part I just quoted is the first point from my interpretation i want to start with: The poetry, set in Bukowski's childhood describes the actions and thoughts from the point of view of the kids, and the entire poetry shows the contrast between adults and kids about how they see the world. I'll soon show you how some parts can be interpreted by both point of views,making this poetry one of the most fascinating and complex of all Bukowswki's work.

So the parents tell the kids to stay away from the house and the kids, because of this warning, become curios and decide to check the place. They want to know who live in there, but as weeks go by, they soon assume the house is abandoned and keep going simply to play in the bamboo and to feed the goldfish. then one day we heard a voice from the house “YOU GOD DAMNED WHORE!” Someone does live in the house; a man. He comes out of the house, we are given a description of him: he was holding a fifth of whiskey in his right hand. he was about 30. he had a cigar in his mouth,

needed a shave. his hair was wild and and uncombed and he was barefoot in undershirt and pants. but his eyes were bright. they blazed with brightness and he said, “hey, little gentlemen, having a good time, I hope?�

then he gave a little laugh and walked back into the house.

The man's eyes is the trait that stands out the most, hence the title of the poetry. they are described later as beautiful. We arrive then at the central part of the story, the most significant one.

The kids go back to Charles house's yard to discuss what just happened: our parents,

we decided, had wanted us to stay away from there because they never wanted us to see a man like that, a strong natural man with beautiful eyes.

our parents were ashamed that they were not like that man, that’s why they wanted us to stay away.

They come out with a story that confirms my theory that we see the story from a kid point of view. For them, the reason their parent had told them not to go the "strange house" is the fact that the man who lives there is someone they feel ashamed as they are not as strong and natural

as him. In reality they were told to stay away from there because the parents knew who lived in there: a man, perhaps an alcholic, a rough individual who is judged negativaly by people, not being the ordinary citizen; an outsider. (which ironically, Charles will become himself) Isn't what people feel of anybody who doens't seem to "fit" for being homeless, a junkie, or simply someone who is vulgar and out of place? The first instict is not be affiliated to them, as we are teached by our parents. Once we grow up we may change our way to think of course, and not see people in the same judgmental way.

Charles and his friends are the exception. They in fact fascinated by that man. But why? Perhaps they never actually met anybody like that man,as due to their age is unlikely the have the chance to be in close contact with someone who is not part of that safe bubble created by a parent.

Family members, school mates, teachers, some familiar aqquitance, this all the people tha are part of a kid's social relationships. So once they meet this stranger they ends up seeing him, a person so out of ordinary, they end up confering him qualities other people on their eyes lack.

They recall him as strong and natural, odd abjectives to describe a person, but for a kid they are words with meaning created by they own.

One of Bukowski quote says: “the free soul is rare, but you know it when you see it - basically because you feel good, very good, when you are near or with them. -from Tales of Ordinary Madness.

This seems to apply in the story. That Man radiates a powerful charisma, which overwhelms deeply the kids.

They returns to the place many more times, but everything is like at the beggining, the shades of the house are always down and no one is seen or heard within it. Then one day, after coming from school they will find the house burned down, and the fish bond drained with the dead fish inside.They once again discuss what just happened in Charles's house yard, and following the story they came out with before, they decide their parents were responsible. they had been afraid of the man with the beautiful eyes.

and we were afraid then that

all throughout our lives things like that would happen, that nobody wanted anybody to be strong and beautiful like that, that others would never allow it, and that many people would have to die.

While the previous thought of the kids were humoursly naive, the last one is instead dark. The kids comes up with a story undoubtedly far-fetched even for them, to justify what happened. But what is the apogee of poetry is how the final thought. They believe there are things that shall be forbidden because their beauty, which in this case, at least for that Man it's just about being unique or better said unusual. It is a reflection that anticipates the line of thinking of the adult Buwkoski, as it express a feeling of despair and uneasiness towards life.

"The Man with The Beautiful Eyes" is a poem that through telling what might seems simply a story of the poet as a child it's actually a retrospective that shows us the inner part of his personality, his feelings and his early concept of life. _____________________________________________________________ Alejandro Rebecchi