Hey, Dolly
she left me 5 weeks ago and went to Utah.
that is, I think she left.
the other day I went out to mail her a letter
and I saw her sitting on the bus stop bench,
it was her hair there
from behind
and all the pounding started in me again
I walked up quickly and looked at the face—
it was somebody else. freckles, pugnose, greeneyes,
nothing, nothing.
then I was on Western Avenue going from bar to bar
and I saw her in front of me again.
I saw those tight pants, I knew that ass,
and there was the hair again,
and the way she walked,
I walked faster to catch her,
I got even with her and saw her face—
an Indian’s nose, blue eyes, a mouth like a frog—
nothing, nothing, nothing.
then there was a girl in a bar playing piano.
it wasn’t her but when the hair fell in a certain way,
for a moment, it was. and the hair was the same length
and the lips were similar but not the same, and
she saw me looking while she was singing, I was drunk,
of course, it helped the delusion, and she
said, is there anything special you want to hear?
Dolly, I said, and she sang—
Hey, Dolly...
just now I looked up and she was across the street.
she walked out of the apartment across the street
with a young blond man and she stood there in sun glasses,
and I thought, what’s she doing across the street in
sun glasses, and she smiled at me through the window
but she didn’t wave and then she got in the car with the
young man, it was a new car, small and red, expensive,
and they drove away toward the west. I’m sure it was
her, this time.
Other works by Charles Bukowski...
