What does Charles Bukowski believe the poem "Splash" can do for us?

I believe that what Bukowski is saying in his poem
"Splash" is that there is life in the words, and not just words on the
paper.

He defies the method of other poets to simply write
ideas on a page: this kind of poetry, Bukowski says, is boring, and so he turns the
tables and announces that what he writes cannot possibly be
poetry.

The idea is that this "poem" goes beyond simple
poetry as it wraps the reader in its words and transports the reader to a place where
the rules don't count, or there are no rules. The ideas may be placed on a page, but the
poetry is born and exists within the reader based upon how the
reader interprets the work.

Bukowski
challenges the reader to try and NOT
to be affected by this poem. He draws the reader into the circle of words with phrases
that evoke images and demand consideration, even if complete understanding of each image
is difficult to grasp. I would guess that the poet is not so concerned that the reader
get it all, but simple that the reader gives the poem a chance to speak in some—or
any—way to its audience.

At the end, the poet
says that the reader can die now with a true knowledge: of
what? This is a good question. It must
(has to) depend on the reader's perceptions, as everything
in poetry (and the world) does! The poet believes that if
you free yourself of the sense that poetry is flat—just a jumble of words—that you truly
understand the beauty a poet
creates——without the restrictions of someone
else's belief (or perhaps even your own) that the words
MUST mean one thing, and that
if you don't get IT, it is meaningless. "Meaning one
thing:" this is NOT true of art: it speaks many languages, and creates many pictures:
and all may be different because it is based on the collection of personal experiences
each member of "the audience" brings with him or her to the specific piece of "art,"
whatever its form: poem, painting, song, etc.

I
would like to believe that the victory Bukowksi speaks of comes from meeting poetry
on your own terms and taking from it what is says specifically to
you, which does not need to be the same as what it says to others.
It is a personal experience, and the sooner readers understand this, the more poetry
speaks to them, and the less it is about reaching some impossible plateau where
all is clear. If so much in life makes us ask thousands of
questions, why would poetry be any different?

Bottom line:
I believe the poet wants us as readers to do just what the title alludes to: it's about
just jumping in, getting wet, and seeing what
happens.

(Please remember that poetry speaks to everyone
differently: it is the nature of poetry—any form of art—to do just
that.)

Hope this is of some help.