Charles Bukowski:
The Aliens (English)
you may not believe it
but there are people
who go through life with
very little
friction or
distress.
they dress well, eat
well, sleep well.
they are contented with
their family
life.
they have moments of
grief
but all in all
they are undisturbed
and often feel
very good.
and when they die
it is an easy
death, usually in their
sleep.
you may not believe
it
but such people do
exist.
but I am not one of
them.
oh no, I am not one
of them,
I am not even near
to being
one of
them
but they are
there
and I am
here.
God bless Charles Bukowski. The guy was so real, so down-to-earth, and his poetry was so real and down-to-earth in its grittiness, that he reaches levels of poetic excellence.
He kept in simple, and he was simply wonderful.
Bukowksi describes these placid, peaceful people as "aliens."
How right he is.
What is an alien, anyway?
A stranger to this world, to the way of doing things in this world. An alien does not play by the rules, because he does not know the rules. In one sense, an alien is most vulnerable, since they know nothing about the country in which they live or wander.
An alien, if we live aside science fiction, is an individual who is not a citizen of the country where he lives and moves and has his being. Alien to the ways of the world, men and women who walk by faith, not by sight, who see God in all of His might holding everything together, never worry about tomorrow, never wonder what the future may hold, because they know who holds the future!
Of course, an alien is also a strange creature, not human, not of this world, one which most people do not understand, a creature which inspires fantasy or fear, yet wonder nonetheless.
An alien existence is the life for those who walk by faith, and not by sight, who do not diminish things eternal just because they do not register all that well with the temporal.
The life of an alien, described by Charles Bukowski, describes the Christian, the believer who trusts in Christ's Finished Work, who knows that He has received a spirit of adoption, by which he can call God "Daddy!" (Roman 8: 15)
There are indeed such aliens, yet not from God:
"21And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled 22In the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight: 23If ye continue in the faith grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel, which ye have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven; whereof I Paul am made a minister" (Colossians 1: 21-23)
Let's take a closer look at Bukowski's poem:
you may not believe it
but there are people
who go through life with
very little
friction or
distress.
The key verb is "believe", not wonder, think, or suppose. It's all about believing, not listening in one's head and reasoning with one's mind. Poetry is all about passing one's thinking and taking in the eternal verities which our minds cannot contain or confine. "Friction" pushes past the natural realities which weigh a man down. Friction is a part of life, or men and women would never be able to hold anything. They would slip and fall on dirt.
But for those who walk by faith, not by sight, they never fall or fail, and even when they make a mistake, the mistake takes them to better places, where they make more.
they dress well, eat
well, sleep well.
they are contented with
their family
life.
They are blessed in every area of their lives. They have left the Old Adam Nature, full of sin and death, and have been taken up with Christ, seated in Heavenly places with Him (Ephesians 2: 4-6)
More succinctly, Paul explains:
"If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you." (John 15: 19)
John later writes:
"Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them: because greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world." (1 John 4: 4)
Aliens live above the world, too, in that they do not mess with the laws of nature and gravity, they are unaffected by the passage of time and trend.
they have moments of
grief
but all in all
they are undisturbed
and often feel
very good.
and when they die
it is an easy
death, usually in their
sleep.
Paul describes the blessed assurance of those who trust in Christ Jesus:
"But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us. 8We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; 9Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed; 10Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body. 11For we which live are alway delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh. 12So then death worketh in us, but life in you." (2 Corinthians 4: 7-12)
Paul also wrote:
"For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us." (Romans 8: 18)
For those of us who are in this world, but not of it, the present suffers cannot take away our future glory, and Christ Jesus causes us to triumph in all that we do (2 Corinthians 2: 14), and we are assured that in Christ we are more than conquerors (Romans 8: 37)
And believers in Christ do not die, for they receive eternal life, although they sleep in their dead bodies, only to rise again in the last day. Indeed, death is passed for those who believe on Him whom the Father has sent for us (John 6: 29)
you may not believe
it
but such people do
exist.
but I am not one of
them.
oh no, I am not one
of them,
I am not even near
to being
one of
them
but they are
there
and I am
here.
The issue is one of belief, something that Charles Bukowski refused to do.
Such people do exist, but they do more than just exist. Their lives are poetry in motion, grace upon grace:
"But by the grace of God I am what I am: and his grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain; but I laboured more abundantly than they all: yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me." (1 Corinthians 15: 10)
Even when they fail, God goes out of His way to prosper them:
"20Moreover the law entered, that the offence might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound: 21That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord." (Romans 5: 20-21)
and
"And God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work:
9(As it is written, He hath dispersed abroad; he hath given to the poor: his righteousness remaineth for ever." (2 Corinthians 9: 8-9)
God's righteousness and grace are foreign to the world, since the world is based on earn your righteousness and take pride in what you have done. With God in Christ, we do not earn anything, but keep on receiving His gifts of righteousness and grace (Romans 5: 17)
The poem has to admit twice that he is not one of those "aliens", that he is not close to being one of them.
Yet we are called to a new status of being, in Christ:
"But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: 13Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." (John 1: 12-13)
and
"Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world." (1 John 4: 17)
Because God came down and became man, the same way the science fiction writers depict aliens like Superman, so to we cannot come to Him, so He came to us instead.
Charles is wrong about one thing, as are many, even in churches -- being an alien in this world and being received in Christ for all eternity is as easy as believing on Him.
