John Thomas Inlet

John Thomas Idlet (John Thomas) an American Beat poet who wrote sporadically and had an aversion to publishing his work. Charles Bukowski called him "the best unread poet in America."

At Venice Beach Thomas worked as the manager and chef of the Gas House, a project which aimed to provide free meals to poets and artists who were living rent-free at the Grand HotelMenus were planned based on the amount of money gathered in a gallon jar by tourists who had ogled the beatniks during the day.Ingenuity was needed, and Thomas used cheap fish, and "filet mignon", which as actually horse meat bought from a local pet store. Thomas declared himself a writer, but when the poet Maurice Lacy asked what specifically he wrote, he replied unthinkingly, "I'm a poet".As a result he was obliged to write some poems, and was learned much about the craft from the poet Stuart Perkoff.Poetry came more easily than the novels, but even poetry was a struggle for the writer, and "NOT writing and deep inability to write became his central theme if not celebrity". As he wrote in "Apologia"

He recognized that he had always wanted to be a man who had written books, rather wanting t