My Charles Bukowski Moment

Yes. I Want My Work to Be Fucking Seen.

Art Credit: ART: Matteo Bernasconi

I’ve got a sacred rant of a poem to share with you today.

Set and setting is everything—so let me set the scene for you.

There is this meme doing the rounds in the creative community online and then assumedly in the world also. It is this idea that you don’t need others to like your art, or validate your writing; you just need to create.

“Create For You!” is the essence of the slogan.

I get it.

Bless you all, I get it.

It’s about growing past the need for validation or at least not letting that be the starting pistol to ‘get you off’ or running your own race.

Yes! Amen.

The idea is that we should defy the ‘monkey dance’ for ‘likes’ the algorithm rewards. The idea is that we should do what creatives do and restore the creative culture.

Double Amen and a flaming-trousers Halelujah to that.

The idea is that we need the quiet struggling voices, because the nature of your struggle is going to be someone else’s, and the airwaves are being taken up by all the dullards and the mouth breathers and the bad faith actors, and they are destroying our Commons.

The Internet is our Commons now. So I get it. Don’t wait for permission! Just start creating. But there is a confusion being smuggled on that same noble carrier signal. It implies you should not be focusing on trying to make a living from your craft and calling, and that is where I’ve got a problem.

The creatives also, are not the only ones who are trying to bleed their souls into this shared moment. There are our thought leaders, our wayfinders, our philosophers and myth weavers, who are also fighting for breath now. And they absolutely need to be heard. We need to hear what they have to say. They are the key to our existential survival. Together with the creatives, these are the prophets of our generation.

In solidarity with that, I’m challenging the notion that it’s okay just to quietly and nobly create for the sake of creating.

Plus, I need to eat. I am not doing this work just to express myself and play with my craft. I fucking care about what happens to this world, and the world we are going to leave for our kids. I am deeply galvanised by the theft and vandalism of our own horizon of possibility that we are all complicit in, even if only through a kind of self-imposed impotence.

Like other thought leaders and urban mystics and digital prophets, my voice and my work are hugely necessary, it is thankless and difficult, and I am utterly up against the deluge of pablum and idle monkey chatter, which makes up most of our online content. Fuck content.

I am not farming likes for the sake of it, or for validation. But I still need to put food on the table. There are over 200 people who follow this Substack. I am grateful for every single one of them. They mean something to me.

I am also aware that 14 of those 200, that is six percent, make a small financial contribution. I am glad and grateful for all of it, even the passive followership, but most especially for the supporters. You have no idea how much I appreciate you, and I have been remiss in saying it out loud, and I’m going to fix that. I am going to own and address that. It’s unacceptable and it is not a symptom of my lack of appreciation, but a symptom of my own fear of sounding like a dickhead.

I appreciate the folks who share, comment and engage, even just a simple like, without which the infernal algorithm wouldn’t know or care that here is something that a human being cares about.

If any of my work has nourished you, has helped you grow as a person, has filled your spiritual belly or fed the fire of your philosophical soul, you’ll understand how everything comes down to this archetypal idea, this reality of ‘filling our bellies’. We all need to be nourished and sustained in this world. The whole modern human operating system boils down to how we fill and nourish our bellies. For the price of a cup of coffee a month, you could be helping me fill mine, and you could be supporting this deeply necessary work.

And please, find the sense of community and leadership in yourself that normalises the idea that engagement with the work and content creators that matter to us, is how we get the internet we want. We need each other.

I’ve got a sacred rant of a poem to share with you today, and to get you in the mood, here is an apt quote from Charles Bukowski.

“The free soul is rare, but you know it when you see it – basically because you feel good, very good, when you are near or with them. Find what you love and let it kill you. We're all going to die, all of us, what a circus! That alone should make us love each other, but it doesn't.”

Charles Bukowski

AN ODE TO THE BUKOWSKI IN ME

I read this today and the drunken foul-mouthed thunderer in me came alive.
Someone sweet and thoughtful had written:
“𝑰’𝒎 𝒏𝒐𝒕 𝒘𝒓𝒊𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒕𝒐 𝒃𝒆 𝒔𝒆𝒆𝒏.
 𝑰’𝒎 𝒘𝒓𝒊𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒕𝒐 𝒔𝒆𝒆.”

Bless her.

Sister, 
I ‘got to be real with you. 
I am absolutely writing to be seen. 
I am bleeding my soul 
through that fucking keyboard, 
and it is that harsh bitter medicine for the soul, 
called Necessity. 
Like friars balsam.
It is an enema for the apathetic,
its a stinging salve 
for the raw and suppurating wound 
of the world. 

It is the old magic 
of agony and prayer
I am hoping will invoke 
the better angels of our nature, 
the desperate sparks and the lamp oil 
I hope will shine a light in the dark 
and point us towards 
the shrinking portal 
to our flickering destiny. 

Gods, I want it to be seen.
I want it emblazoned 
onto hearts like a flaming tar.

I want it etched into the bedposts
of our culture.
I want to see the graffiti of it 
under bridges,
on bus stops.

I want it to sear like Sananga drops in the eye.

I want the memes to endure
on mugs and t-shirts.

I want it to catch the eye,
like naked breasts used to.
It should capture the gaze
like a sunset, 
set to the soundtrack 
of a choir of angels, 
cranked to Volume twelve.
—if that’s what it takes,
it should rake crass 
at our cringing, bitch-soft ears,
the bass of it should hit us 
in the chest.

I want the curling sneer 
of its threat and grimace
remembered 
everytime we hear the wolf 
of winter and hard times 
howling in the closing darkness.
I want it to drive its mustang drunk
right through the living room 
of our dull sobriety.
I want the shotgun crack of it
to silence the room 
with the awkward suddenness 
of a record needle scratch.

I want it to land like the fattest drop.

It should hit you in the mouth 
and rock you into presence.

Good lord 
I want it to inspire us,
to remember why we are here
what is still possible
and that no one else is coming.

So, yeah,
I totally want it to be seen.

—Rocco Jarman, 23 April 2025

We all eat lies when our hearts are hungry, so Like this and Share this, ye godless bastards!

With real Love,

Rocco

I don’t just want to speak to an audience, I want to belong to a community.

I don’t just want to express my ideas, I want us to dream new ones together.

You can help support my meaningful work by liking, sharing this post, and commenting—anything you can think of that is meaningful—and you can make a fuss of these ideas with your social circles. And of course, as always, by subscribing and inviting others. Your paid subscription helps make this work possible.