"Who in the hell is Tom Jones" by Charles Bukowski

I subscribe to a few 'poem a day' services that drop a wide spectrum of verse into my inbox each day. Some good, same awful, some incomprehensible, some wonderful.  A quick scan usually lets me know what to do: ignore or read.  Today a poem by Charles Bukowski came in: 'Who the hell is Tom Jones'. This is one to listen to rather than read (Try the Youtube Spoken Verse channel). It came with a note purporting to be written by one of the protagonists in the drama.  I accept it is. It adds to the story and fills out my perception of the poet: someone who tended to write his words to suit the persona he created.  A persona that wasn't real but he had, nonetheless, a great talent.
 

I was the naive girl from NYC. Bukowski wrote this poem to promote the image of this hard-drinking, womaniser that he so fiercely wanted the public to believe was true. Yes he drank heavily, and at 55 he was not able to fulfil all that "shacking up" implies, not with me at least. The drawing is not representative of me or his drunk girlfriend. He wrote other versions of this incident, all to make himself look like the sought-after Casanova. He wrote marvellous, inaccurate drama.