Charles Bukowski - The Rooming House Madrigals Poems deal with rejection, history, barbershops, friendship, death, longing, loneliness, and disappointment. This is the Bukowski of 1946-1966. The poet of gritty backwaters of great faceless cities, rainy bus stations and flophouse one-night stands; also of the moon shining in the gutter, and of the morning-after joys of making love in the sun.