Thursday, November 1, 2012

Philosopher Kings



image borrowed from bing


Philosopher Kings

“I would like to live as a poor man
with lots of money.”--Pablo Picasso

Woke up weary this morning
with Beat It banging in my head,
nightmarish Halloween images of Michael
moonwalking, crotch-grabbing, his Borselino
pulled low over his mascaraed eyes,
his nose hanging broken to one side, 
a damaged soul genius probable-pedophile
who slept in coffins, kept several llamas
in his living room, whom I think paid someone
to give birth to his prodigy pets, conceived
no doubt with a spangled turkey baster
loaded with his fresh spank-bank spunk,
forever draped in fake military finery, those
red sashes heavy with bogus golden medals,
and those goddamn Ghadaffi epaulettes
beefing up his pale bony shoulders,
sure, sure, just

blame it on his father, old weird Joe,
blame it on the Catholic Church
who still deny the buggerings of the past,
blame it on the rogue Mormons, forcing
sexual advances on their harem of 12 year olds, 

blame it squarely on the snake-like trunks
of the Republicans letting George W. perch
atop his Texas barn like a lunatic weather vane,
taking pot shots at torrents of tourists
who want to see with their own non-digital sight-- 
mechanisms a living example of American Fascism,
some of which want to see Junior twisting black
on a barbeque spit with Greeks and Mexicans
arguing over who gets to eat his evil eyes,

blame it on the bearded zealous followers
of Islam, who have twisted America
into a carnival fear festival, robbing us
of the old joy of flying, of being able to
meet our sweethearts at the gate
with open arms and hearts,
stealing our dignity,
               our shoes,
               our patience,
               our liberty
               our wages,

blame the slimy industrialists, 
sitting like Scrooge McDuck
in their vast mink-lined vaults
counting their callous cash
one thousand dollar bill at a time
with bevies of naked women dancing
seductively while spoon feeding them
Ben & Jerry’s on real silverware,
watching the specter of 5 buck gas,
dash through their stations like insane streakers,
just giving us a sour taste, 
a drive through molestation,
before pushing the costs below 4 bucks, making us
so very grateful, 
so confused,
so exhausted
so disenchanted

that some of us might vote Republican
enabling the mercs of Blackwater
and Haliburton to jack live loads
into their smoking barrels, eager
to plant bloody boots on the ground
somewhere in the Middle East, Latin America,
Mexico, Asia, Africa, the Gulf Coast,
any place where crude oil wells are pumping,
where overloaded tankers run heavy and low
in our turbulent times, 
where off shore oil rigs provide them
with excesses to cache, to hoard,
to trickle out arrogantly complete with
pestering price tags that fluctuate hourly,

blame it on the Corn lobby, on Ethanol 
that pollutes petroleum to the point
where our small engines cannot process it,
giving us the gift of 
corn-sludge in our carburetors, 

blame it on Global Warming,
on that hybrid morphidite bitch
that Nature has become, 
whelping super storms,
mating hurricanes to Nor’easters,
cutting a thousand mile swath of destruction,
flooding, blizzards, high winds and devastation,

blame it on the pithy politicians, venerable dictators,
and Tammany Hall oligarchists who
brazenly manipulate the media, spinning
tragedy into That’s Entertainment, pushing
microphones into the weeping faces
of surviving family members, descending
like larcenous locusts on 
every conflict,
every storm,
every homicide,

or just be straight up, no bullshitting, no spinning,
no truth-bending, no instant replay fact checking,

and blame ourselves for Christ’s sake,
face the painful fact that we will always
reap what we sow. 


Glenn Buttkus

November 2012

Posted over on dVerse Poets MTB

Would  you like to hear the author read this postmodern poem to you?
               

14 comments:

Unknown said...

Wow, this is one of those works of art where no one gets out alive. Masterfully drawn and sharply executed. You sure kept my attention throughout and illuminated our insanity with a spotlight. Magnificent!

Lane Savant said...

Boom!

Lane Savant said...

Why does this thing always print two?

Glenn Buttkus said...

That's uber cool, Doug, removed the offensive duplication. Thanks for stopping by.

Brian Miller said...

whole lot of truth in that one....we all are looking to blame someone else...it takes the pressure off of it being our fault....that says as much of our society as anything right there...creatively done...love th approach man...

Jeff said...

A strong piece of writing here, Glenn. Geez. Too many good lines to even pick a favorite.

henry clemmons said...

Wow, you just about blamed everybody, but how true, when it comes to the rubber meeting the road, we all point the finger at ourselves. I think this is what Anna was after. Nice job.

Susan Daniels said...

Glenn--you totally hit this on all levels, and took no prisoners. Loved it.

Anonymous said...

shakespare said something odd once. 'the world is our stage' and glenn your ending would fit here. weel done

Dave King said...

Ticks all my boxes -- and a few I'd not thought of. I'm glad we didn't escape. It's never us that fucks up, is it? Magnificent.

Beachanny said...

Get down Allen Ginsberg - this is a true Howl of a protest poem - voices everything I think, everything everyone thinks, puts the modern world in the crosshairs and leaves nothing unsaid - or at least not much. Send it out- it should be in print. Let it blow to all corners of the globe - let 'em know the Daily Planet now owned by Lex Luther (ehr going by the name of Rupert Murdoch) needs to be brought low!

Anonymous said...

Excellent

And "if the soul within us does not change, the world outside us will never change"

The wheel of the world whorls on the same as it ever was

The blame game, everybody always conveniently forgets what happened yesterday

And people exploit tragedy for a dollar

mrs mediocrity said...

wow. you just forced me to dig my head up out of the sand (i was trying to hide there until after the election.) this was incredibly well done, incredibly powerful, and just exactly right on the mark.
or, in other words, wow.

Anonymous said...

Very mature piece... reading and even better, listening to your piece is like taking in fine wine.

Reading it, your initial banter about Michael filled me with question and yet you managed to draw me all the same.

Good stuff!