Burma Shave Bequests

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Burma Shave Bequests

“All media exist to invest our lives with

artificial perceptions & arbitrary values.”

--Marshall McLuhan

Robert Frost don’t know a thing about me

or my roads--but certainly he did understand

your spirit & your heart, as poets must,

as they wander too often lost, taking

notes during the chaos, joys, wars,

tragedies & celebrations. 

A man recently while walking a beach on

Vancouver Island, found a 106 year old bottle

with a paper message inside, and he refused

to open it--knowing that when today’s air

touches 1906 paper, something tragic could

occur, as words might fade, & the writer

could lose the spider’s thread tether to this world. 

Miss New York was overheard saying that the present

Miss America was “fat as fuck”--allowing some of the

vitriol & ugliness to mushroom up through the mystery

of almost perfect bodies packaging imperfect minds,

exposing both the best & worst of our dreams,

simultaneously as New CMA star Casey Musgraves revealed

that she was still resentful (smile) about losing the Miss

Tater-Tot beauty pageant when she was ten years old--

reinforcing the rancor one feels about the arbitrary course

of success, watching a performer under 30 tasting of

Luck while it is still fresh & steaming, fearing 

that it may go cold before she can wholly consume it,

or it consumes her. 

What if God were one of us, just a slob like one of us?--

question many in lesson, still ignorant about the facts,

not realizing that He/She/it has always been present

within our personal viscera, invisible but extant,

smaller than a nano-virus yet bigger than a cosmos,

while transcending & disdaining those who strive

to transform it to rules of order within the countless

factions of religious realm. 

How you murdered your family means nothing to me

as your mouth moves across my body--because

inevitably eros trumps empathy, orgasm drowns

rationale, breasts are better than burdens, 

and certainly your silken legs wrapped around

my butt like a tender vise, momentarily blinds

me to politics, godheads, jehadists, insults,

massacres, migraines, & dust mites,

because the temporal reality of intense coitus,

while we are functioning together as one entity,

passionately reconnects us to genesis,

and provides a beautiful blindness

to every sort of shit storm. 

There’s a crow flying, black & ragged, tree to tree,

& now he is diving down to pick up something shiny--

perhaps a new element covered in extraterrestrial symbols,

perhaps a piece of chrome off a Corvette,

perhaps an inner gum wrapper wadded into a ball,

perhaps that message from the bottle

as it oxidizes, slaying the message,

banishing the messenger. 

Glenn Buttkus

September 2013

Posted over on dVerse Poets Poetics

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No Tears For Mama

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No Tears For Mama

“Child abuse casts a shadow the length

of a lifetime.”--Herbert Ward

"On behalf of

her children who she abrasively

exposed to her

evil and violent

life, we celebrate her passing

from this earth

and hope she

lives in the after-life

reliving each gesture

of violence, cruelty

and shame that she delivered

on her children.”

Thus the passing

of Marianne Theresa Johnson-Reddick

will be remembered. 

Glenn Buttkus

September 2013

Posted over on G-Man's Flash 55

Misfits: the blue notes

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Misfits: the blue notes

“Learn the changes, then forget them.”

--Charlie Parker

 Rhythm

John Huston looked like he was dying,

oxygen hose in his nose, red-rimmed

sleep-deprived eyes, silver shock of beard,

sweaty hair unkempt, smoking cigars regardless,

tapping his foot & setting the beat

for his stark imagery, choked in white dust,

bathed in desert darkness--

call & response as Arthur Miller’s prose

comprised the comping, first meant to be

a panegyric valentine for Marilyn, but becoming

the syncopation, something transcendent,

layering the plot line with duplicity & rawness,

wanting to slay the myth of the white-hat Western

and replace the repetitive, the expected, with

those blue notes, Gay, Guido, & Percy,

modern men of the West with sissy names,

who shied away from responsibility & commitment

like a gelding about to step on a rattler,

who cherished & championed freedom

at the total sacrifice of everything & everyone

in their wake.

Melody

Nevada’s high desert landscape was treated,

and filmed like another character in the drama,

as we remain haunted by the sadness of saxophones,

& the bellow of coronets during the horse hunt

as that creaky crop-dusting biplane droned

like a deathly metronome down dark canyons,

herding wild horses out of the hills out onto

the nakedness of the cracked salt flats,

where the blue men & the singing ropes

waited

for those short hardy mustangs, desert warriors

galloping Arabian-hard, breathing deep

their last few gasps of liberty before

the blue arms lassoed their spirits,

capturing their ragged joy, tying them

down to big truck tires, before transporting

them on their last journey to the slaughterhouse,

where they would become glue and food

for poodles and bull dogs.

Harmony

The improvisation was serious & sterling

for those men and mustangs as metaphors

and symbols intertwined, creating

a horrendous new blood-soaked helix,

even as the terrible sadness was counterpointed

by the gentle stirrings of love, that very slim

chance that Gay & Roselyn could take

the broken pieces of their lives & paste

together some kind of relationship,

a delicious dance to a lilting desert song.

Resolution

The fade-out was very upbeat, breaking

the dune-chill with the expert exhalation

of warm breath, and practiced lips,

as their lover’s heads tilted up,

searching for truth amongst the stars

in that clear night sky, searching

for the north star so that they could

follow it home. 

Glenn Buttkus

September 2013

Posted over at dVerse Poets MTB

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Blackthorne--Scene Five

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Blackthorne

Cinemagenic Five

Inquisition

“If Galileo had said in verse that the world had moved, the Inquisition

might have let him alone.”-- Thomas Hardy

1(sound cue) harmonica & violin chords.

2(cut to medium wide-shot) loafer’s POV; the stranger stood for a moment,

kitty-corner across the street, looking back at the three men.

3(hold on previous shot set-up) the stranger stepped back into the street,

untied his big red, and began walking it toward them; the black bear-dog

walked alongside.

4(we see the backs of the three men) as they jump to their feet. 

5(sound cue) Indian snake rattle.

6(close-up) the hatless man: shit, he’s coming over here.

7(cut to reverse shot, stranger’s POV) 

8(sound cue) Indian flute; reedy throbs.

9(medium shot) stranger ties up his horse, we notice that he is wearing

a Sioux leather bracelet on his right wrist. 

10(medium reverse shot--loafer’s POV) the stranger with his big hands

on his hips, hovering over his sidearms, staring at the trio, but not 

speaking.

11(reverse cut, hold 3-shot--stranger’s POV) the hatless man stares

 belligerently, the fat man stares down at the porch, the beanpole stares

at the empty sky.

12(pull back to medium 4-shot) hunter steps over to the wide horse

trough, removes his black flat-brimmed hat, taking a tiny moment to

glance up & down the street; beating his hat against one shoulder as

puffs of dust rise off it.

13(sound cue) frontier accordion & banjo duet chords.

14(medium close up) stranger readjusts the buffalo rifle in its scabbard.

15(close-up) the breech & the trigger assembly on the Sharps.

16(sound cue) banjo chords.

17(medium close-up) stranger fills his hat with water, lets his horse drink,

then pours the rest over his own head; water beads sparkled & dripped off

his dark beard.

18(close-up) the stranger smiled, sharing a mouthful of strong white teeth.

19(medium shot) stranger pats the alkaline dust off his jacket & vaquero

trousers.

20(sound cue) bass drum thumps.

21(close-up) on the front of the hunter’s jacket--there were two rows

of shotgun shells tucked into sewed-on cartridge pockets. 

22(sound cue) buffalo herd hooves.

23(tight close-up) stranger’s deep blue eyes darting right, then left.

24(sound cues) first silence, then the noise of the beanpole kicking

a porch roof stanchion with his boot.

25(close-up) stranger’s face: afternoon, gents.

26(cut to reverse 3-shot) the three men’s faces.

27hatless man: what can we do for you?

28(reverse 4-shot) the backs of the three men, the face of the 

stranger.

29the hunter: kind of  hot, ain’t it?

30(sound cue) violin & accordion duet.

31(hold the 4-shot) Voice-over, fat man: yeah, hotter than

a red mule’s fart.

32(cut to close-up) the stranger: any of you citizens happen to

know if the old Buck place is still deserted?

Glenn Buttkus

Posted over on dVerse Poets OLN113

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On This Day

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On This Day

“When the reviews were bad, I just

cried all the way to the bank.”--Liberace

Liberace’s former home in Las Vegas,

once valued at $ 3.7 million, with its

20 rooms, 2 kitchens, & six bathrooms, one

with a Greco-Roman sunken tub, was

just sold to a former fan for the chump change

of $325,000.00, who wants to “fix it up”

& open it to the public, so that those fans

who actually remember Liberace’s awesome talent

& showmanship, and not just some sad flamboyant 

homosexual piano player who wore outrageous

costumes, recently portrayed by Michael Douglas

in an HBO movie, & remembering that Liberace himself

tried to be a movie star with SINCERELY YOURS (1955),

but turned out to be just too precious to be asked

to ever make another film--all this as today Celine Dion

listed her Florida Estate at $75.5 million, after

she was awarded for being the Best Female Artist

of All Time, selling 200 million albums, including one

containing the haunting theme from James Cameron’s 

TITANIC,

reminding us that on this day in 1907 the Cunard Line

RMS Lusitania sailed on her maiden voyage from

Liverpool, UK to NYC, soon to be overshadowed

by the maiden voyage of the RMS Titanic in 1912

from Southhampton, UK to NYC, the first becoming

a catalyst for WWI, the second becoming legend.

Who could forget that on this day in 1876

the James/Younger gang was shot to pieces

by armed civilians as they tried to rob a bank

in Northfield, Minnesota, the event later being

made into a fair Western with Robert Duvall

playing a bi-polar Jesse, and Cliff Robertson

playing a poetic Cole, but soon overshadowed

by Walter Hill’s classic film THE LONG RIDERS, 

with the Keach brothers playing the James boys

and the Carradine brothers playing the Youngers,

to the ass-kicking strains of Ry Cooder’s 

six-string slide guitar score, becoming for me

the cinematic apex of that historical moment;

but also on this day the lovely actress Maria Montez,

at only 39 years of age, suffered a heart attack

and drown in her bathtub--the same age my mother

died in 1966, and although she was never actually

called the Queen of Technicolor, she was always

the star of my life’s movie,

and today as Syria looms large in our hearts & minds,

as those Tomahawk missiles are humming at the ready,

even after a bloody decade of war with Islam, having

launched the New Millennium Crusades, as we ready

ourselves to catapult American ordinance, soon followed

by American lives into the growing inferno of religious-

political insanity, even as Iran vows to brutally attack

Americans everywhere if the US hits Syria, certainly

we recall that on this day in 1191, Richard the Lionheart

defeated Saladin at Arsuf during the 3rd Crusade. 

Did you know that Buddy Holly was born on this day

in 1936, overshadowed by his death at 23 in a plane crash,

the day the music died as I drove my Chevy to the levy,

making it clear that as each day passes into tomorrow,

it becomes a diverse monument to memory, to history,

to folly, fodder for artists, & the breath of life

for poets. 

Glenn Buttkus

September 2013

Posted over on dVerse Poets Poetics

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Richard III: Back From the Grave

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Richard III; Back From the Grave

“An honest tale speeds best, being

plainly told.”--William Shakespeare

We do not know his full name,

this much maligned monarch,

slain by Henry Tudor’s smaller forces

on August 22, 1485 at the Battle

of Bosworth Field; unhorsed, no helmet,

he faced the pikes & swords alone,

losing the decisive battle of the

War of the Roses,

and it was written that his corpse was mistreated,

stripped naked, sustaining several humiliation

injuries, then buried in a small narrow grave,

legs broken, hands tied behind his back, with

no RIP for this crumpled corpse;

yet now his skeletal remains have been unearthed

beneath an English Car Park in Leicester, found

among the ruins of Greyfriars friary, after five

troubled centuries, despite historical rumors

that his body had been dug up several hundred

years before & dumped in a nearby river, 

after years of constant demolition & rebuilding,

after the monarch’s grave had been lost to history,

his skeleton has returned, found mere inches

from old brick foundations,

and the bones tell a tale of violent death,

10 wounds, 8 to the head, 2 to the body,

and that he had suffered with a round worm

infection, and had a severe case of scoliosis,

perhaps debunking the idea he was a hunchback.

They found a descendent of the House of York,

compared the DNA, and it was an exact match,

before setting into motion heated arguments

over the royal remains--should he be re-buried

with a state funeral at Westminster Abbey?

No, it was decided that the king would be

reinterred at Leicester Cathedral, close to

where he died in battle, one of the very few

English monarchs to do so on British soil.

Perhaps now the history books will be

rewritten & corrected as the bone shards

of truth spoke clearly, as many 15th Century

Tudorists have become restless in their

own graves, still clinging with dead fingers

to their politically-perverted biased

version of his colorful reign. 

Glenn Buttkus

September 2013

Posted over on dVerse Poets FFA

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Blackthorne--Scene Four

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Blackthorne

Cinemagenic Four

Arrival

“Matter itself is the starting point, and the point of arrival

is the Soul--Hydra at the beginning and Angel at the end.”

--Victor Hugo

1(wide shot) the solitary rider is in the center of the frame.

2(hold on the shot for a 4-count) as the stranger approaches.

3(sound cue) acoustic guitar, Spanish chords.

4(cut to low angle medium shot) the stranger stops mid-street.

he is mounted on a big red stallion, tail up, neck arched, rapping

the dirt with one front hoof. sun is behind him to the east, keeping

his face in dark shadow. 

5(sound cue) a low dangerous growl.

6 a very large black dog, big as a mastiff, appears alongside

the horse. 

7(medium traveling wide shot) stranger walks his spirited steed,

that prances sideways a bit as the tall man urges him on.

8(sound cue) violins playing a slow waltz.

9the stranger reins up abreast of the three loafers in front

of the saloon.

10(sound cues) clinking beer glasses, piano playing briskly. 

11(medium four-shot) seeing the stranger’s wide back &

shoulders, leather fringed, as he faces the three men.

12(cut to a slow pan of the three men’s faces) left to right,

the hatless man, the fat man, & the beanpole--each of

them noticeably uncomfortable.

13(sound cue) juice harp thwacking, piano music fading.

14(cut to medium shot) stranger guides his horse to the right,

facing the camera, and continues to walk it toward the lens--

the loafers all standing motionless as he moved down the street.

15(close up) stranger’s face, shoulder-length dark locks, bright

blue eyes, full untrimmed beard with thick silver streaks to each

side of his strong jaw; wearing a flat-brimmed black hat with a

rattlesnake skin sweat band.

16(medium close-up) a .55-120 Sharps buffalo rifle being cradled

across the pommel, held steady with his left hand, holding the

reins with his right. 

17(cut to close-up) first holster, black leather with a silver inlay of

a rearing stallion, tied down snugly to his right leg.

18(extreme close-up) the pistol is a Colt .41 Thunderer, with deer-horn

handle grips.

19(sound cue) Spanish guitar chords

20(pull back to medium close-up) panning down his right leg,

revealing Mexican-style vaquero leather pants, cinched with

white bone buttons, and shin-high buckskin boots, decorated

with Dakota Sioux markings on the sides.

21(sound cue) Native American flute & rattlesnake tail rattle.

22(cut to medium wide shot) the front of WALLACE’S GENERAL

STORE, ranch & mining tools in one window, and calico dresses

and denim cowboy shirts on mannequins in the other window. 

23(hold on previous shot set-up) as the stranger enters the frame,

dismounts & ties off at a hitching rail, slides the Sharps into a 

scabbard, moving toward two steps cutup onto the board walkway.

24(medium close-up) his second holster, wide & thick, tied down

with a rawhide lace to his left leg, holding a sawed-off shotgun.

25(sound cue) trumpet riffs, then fade to buffalo herd hooves.

26(another medium close-up) we see the stranger’s massive

back & shoulders, lifting up with muscular tension.

27(sound cue) silence.

28a soft breeze makes the leather fringes on his shirt dance.

29(cut to medium shot) the black dog trots past the red horse

and plops down in front of the steps, staring back at the loafers

as the stranger stepped up onto the boardwalk.

30(sound cue) gentle harmonica riffs.

31the stranger leans in to read a hanging sign on the inside of

the glass-paned door.

32(close-up) in bright red capital letters: OUT TO LUNCH. 

Glenn Buttkus

September 2013

Posted over on dVerse Poets Poetics for OLN112. 

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