The Laughing Heart by Charles Bukowski

 

The Laughing Heart by Charles Bukowski

your life is your life

don’t let it be clubbed into dank submission.

be on the watch.

there are ways out.

there is light somewhere.

it may not be much light but

it beats the darkness.

be on the watch.

the gods will offer you chances.

know them.

take them.

you can’t beat death but

you can beat death in life, sometimes.

and the more often you learn to do it,

the more light there will be.

your life is your life.

know it while you have it.

you are marvelous

the gods wait to delight

in you.

-- by Charles Bukowski

The laughing heart by Charles

The poem the laughing heart by Charles Bukowski sends a clear message that you should live your life to its full potential and grab every opportunity you get. It is also stated that you shouldn’t be consumed by darkness and that you must find a light in every situation.

In my opinion, this poem is a great influence and guide on how to live your life in the best possible way as it gives clear instructions in small sentences to show that those phrases don’t need explaining and that they send a strong enough message without needing to be explained into detail. It also emphasises that anyone can do this. Furthermore, the short sentences encourage the reader to read on and uncover more.

The repetition of “life” and “death” supports the idea that you only have one shot at life. It says “don’t be clubbed into dark submission” and “there are ways out” meaning that you shouldn’t give up on life because it is too short and there is always an alternative way out when you are in a dark spot. The repetition of “your life is your life” points out to the readers that it is your life and you are the one in control. The writer has written that there “may not be much light but it beats the darkness”. This phrase goes to show that the good parts of your life will make you feel better and will remember and cherish them more than the dark times. It is written “the gods will give you chances” furthermore informing the message that you always have options.

What struck me most when finding this poem was the poem's title. This interested me as the heart is known to be a metaphorical place where all feelings are stored and when it was written the heart was laughing my initial idea was that this title could represent someone who loved to laugh or make people laugh or that it could be someone who liked to laugh but put on a mask and disguised that around different people. My first impressions of the title were that it also contains elements of happiness, joy and relationships among others.

This title, in my opinion, is a great fit to the content as the word heart is an organ and represents life and that it has to end sometime and the laughing shows how you should live your life. The word heart cleverly associates to the repetition of the word in the poem "beat" as a heart beets to survive. It also represents that you need this organ to live but the other word in the title "laughing" compares to being a metaphorical need for survival, highlighting its importance when going through life.