linda king | sweet & dirty

Linda King | Sweet & Dirty

SWEET & DIRTY

by Linda King

© 1972, 1974, 2013 Linda King

Sweet & Dirty by Linda King is re-issued by Hcolom and Vagabond Press in collaboration with outlawpoetry.com and printed in France. Cover design by Cindy Krieble.

John Bennett
John Bennett

Linda King

showed up in the Vagabond Press mailbox, unsolicited, back in 1972, in Redwood City, California. I’d never heard of her before, but the poems she sent had fire and were free of pretension. I wrote asking if she might have enough material for a chapbook, and she sent the manuscript for Sweet & Dirty. It was only then that I realized she was connected to Bukowski.

Vagabond published the book, to the delight of some and the disgust of others. Most of what we published tended to draw these extreme reactions. It was a short press run and was gone in a flash.

True to its name, Vagabond was always on the move — Munich, D.C., New Orleans, San Francisco, etc., and in 1974, in Ellensburg, Washington, we brought out a second edition of Sweet & Dirty. It too was gone in a flash.

It’s now 2013 with lots of water under the bridge. I hadn’t thought about Sweet & Dirty in a long time, and then Herr Klaus of Outlaw Poetry, a powerhouse literary web site operating out of France, contacted me with the request to bring out a third edition.

I agreed, Linda agreed, and here it is. The poems in Sweet & Dirty still have their fire, and also, I realize now, their innocence.

What goes around comes around.

John Bennett – Ellensburg, WA, August 10, 2013

Linda King and Charles Bukowski
Linda King & Charles Bukowski Photo: Courtesy, Linda King

LINDA KING

was raised in the small (population, 100) Mormon town of Boulder, Utah, on a cattle ranch. Her father ran cattle on rugged mountain and canyon terrain, using his five daughters as cowboys and hay hands. Her mother owned the only store in town, supplying everything anyone needed: groceries, hardware, cowboy hats and saddle blankets. Linda attended the University of Utah for one year before moving to Los Angeles where she married an Italian/American from Boston whom she’d met when she was sixteen. Two children, a divorce, and then she met Charles Bukowski. This was back in the Seventies.

Linda now lives in San Francisco. Her recent books are Loving and Hating Charles Bukowski, and Mad Ouija, a book about her breakdown in the Sixties, both from Kisskill Press, P.O. Box 320563, S.F., CA 84132. An excerpt from Loving and Hating Charles Bukowski is scheduled for publication in the anthology American Woman on the Edge.

Linda sculpts busts of poets, writers and artists, and her living space is overflowing with her sculptures of nudes. She hopes to be leaving San Francisco soon to find a less-costly place in the world to live. Where, she says, is anyone’s guess.

LOVE

THAT SON OF A BITCHIN’ STUFF
GOT TO WATCH IT
IT’S LIKE COTTON CANDY
SWEET AND MELTS IN YOUR MOUTH
BUT THERE’S NEVER AS MUCH AS YOU THOUGHT

LIKE SUGAR IN WATER
YOU KEEP POURING IT IN
AND IT DISAPPEARS
THE WATER TASTES SWEET ALRIGHT
AND THEN IT GETS STICKY

YOU SAY YOU LOVE ME
WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?
THAT YOU LIKE YOUR COCK IN A WOMAN?
THAT I LOOK PRETTY ON YOUR ARM?
DON’T SAY YOU LOVE ME
SAY SOMETHING KIND

by Linda King from Sweet & Dirty

Buy linda king | sweet & dirty here.

Editors Note: Please allow 2 weeks for shipment. The book will be produced only on demand and is handmade from A to Z.

click the Hcolom Press logo to visit the web page...HCOLOM PRESS is the heir to Vagabond Press, which began as a main player in the Mimeo Revolution of the Sixties and continued publishing right into the jaws of the new millennium. HCOLOM PRESS embodies the spirit of Vagabond Press, retooled for the times we live in. Hcolom is Moloch spelled backwards. Moloch is an Old Testament deity to which children were sacrificed, a practice society still engages in with increased enthusiasm. Consumerism is the new Moloch, manifesting itself like cancer in war, politics, the arts and religion, in every nook and cranny of human endeavor, draining the intrinsic beauty out of life and mutilating the innocence and magic of childhood with its commercial meat hook. HCOLOM PRESS intends to publish books that by their nature repudiate this pernicious force–novels, poetry, children’s books and books that transcend genre. Our launch book, in June of 2006, was John Bennett’s novel, Tire Grabbers, a fable of sorts, a reality book rooted in the fantasy of our times, the story of the coming of Moloch and the children who rise up in rebellion against it.

Books of kindred spirit will follow close on its heels. Go for it by clicking here… or hit the Hcolom logo above… or just hit any of the following covers…

0 Replies to “linda king | sweet & dirty”

  1. On the road. Finally in Tempe. ow to find my checks for I can get check in mail for your most recent offer and for a copy of Linda King’s book.

    Complexities. Family moving out and I’ve got to find a tenant.

    But first, Where the hell are the checks?

    Later

  2. John,
    Linda told me the other day that it was coming out soon but sort of downplayed it like most people who don’t toot their own horns. Have you read her memoir Loving and Hating Bukowski? The presentation is sort of off-putting but once you get past that, I loved it. I’ve been talking with her for a long time about getting it cleaned up and doing another edition. I think it’s an important book – about Bukowski, about LA, about the times, about love sex, writers and rebellion. Who could ever forget the great scene with you knocking some guy down the stairs and tossing chairs through the windows of the City Lights guest apartment in SF? I live right across the alley from that building and since reading Linda’s book, can’t help but visualize that every time I walk by. Anyhow, I’m glad you discovered her back in 1972 and I’m glad Outlaw Press is coming out with a new edition.
    Keep them shards, coming, amigo!
    Robert

  3. My copy of this edition of Linda King’s chapbook has arrived and I can say, forthrightly, that it looks great … I’m genuinely glad to have added this one to my collection … DaP

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.