Bukowski on Mundane Conversation and Poets

When I hear some people talking I am confounded with how far way they are from anything. Most of them speak what they have been taught, not what they have learned. And what they lack most are two things: gamble and humor. Especially the poets. The poets are the worst. But hell, I suppose if I were mainly a painter I'd say that the painters are the worst.

-Charles Bukowski, 1986