Both Ways Now

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 Both Ways Now

I Lost My Way

I lost my way. I forgot to call on your name. The raw 

heart beat against the world, and the tears were for

my lost victory. But you are here. You have always

been here. The world is all forgetting, and the heart

is a rage of directions, but your name unifies the

heart, and the world is lifted into its place. Blessed

is the one who waits in the traveller’s heart for his

turning.--Leonard Cohen

I Found My Way

The raw heart

and the tears

have always been here.
I was just

blind to them

Now,

even though the world

can be all forgetting,

you are here

again.

You have unified

the chaos

within my heart.

Wisely,

I was the one

who waited.

All I really

had to do

was call your name,

and you appeared,

arms wide open,

willing to help me

find my way.

We became

a duo again,

us against the world.

Blessed with Love,

no longer a lost victory.

Following your sweet directions

I am lifted into my place

in this conundrum.

I no longer

have to rage and curse.

My angry heart

has turned from stone

to apple sauce,

for the traveller

has returned,

saying:

Home is where

the heart is.

Glenn Buttkus 

Posted over at d'Verse Poet's Pub

Earth to Earth

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Earth to Earth

“I tell you, the past is just a bucket of ashes.”

--Carl Sandburg.

One day,

sooner

than later,

my meatsuit

will be

burned to ash.

Just

a box

of ashes,

like so much

trash.

I have

the ashes

from

our last 

family dog.

But how

do you check

the validity

of the ash,

after spending

the cash?

Glenn Buttkus

Quadrille

Posted over at d'Verse Poet's Pub

Blackthorne Episode 143

image from texasmonthly.com 

Blackthorne

Cinemagenic 143

Hellfire

“She is both hellfire and holy water; as to which

depends on how you treat her.”--Anonymous.

1(sound cue) seven pistols emptying their cylinders,

shots merging like rolling thunder, like the savage

maw of a tornado--over coronet and piano.

2(medium wide shot) seven times six filling the air with

lead, a swarm of killer hornets. A baroque crystal lamp

at the top of the stairs shattered twenty-fold, and huge

ragged craters pocked the expensive oak paneling on

the corridor wall. Then it was quiet.

3( close-up ) Buck could hear a grandfather clock 

striking nine o’clock.

4(voice over) Bronson: Buck, you sonofabitch!

Buck: Cash, you miserable motherfucker!

5(medium close-up) Cash: How do you want this to go?

What do you really want?

6(voice over) Buck: I came for my horse.

Cash: Bullshit--as far as I can reckon, you’ve already

got the Appy. 

7(close up) Buck: Yeah, I do, don’t I?

8(voice-over) So let’s get down to the nut-cutting.

Buck: Hell of a good idea.

9(voice-over) Cash: So?

Buck: Your balls would look real good nailed to

a fence post. 

Silence.

Cash: We found Paulie. He’s almost alive.

Silence.

Cash: Thanks. I can see what’s left of Thor.

Buck: You’re welcome.

10(sound cue) harmonica and violin.

11(close-up) Cash: Buck...Buck, hell’s belles, what

a fucking shit parade. 

Buck: You opted to be Grand Master.

Cash: Seems to me we’re all in and even up.

Buck: How do you figure?

Cash: Look at it. Our people and family are dead.

Both of our ranches are burned to the bricks. I’m

thinking we ought to call a truce, and pick up the 

pieces. What do you say?

Buck: You’d like that, wouldn’t you? Only

problem is you are the scorpion promising

not to sting me if I hold out my hand. You

would watch me holster my iron, and walk

out into a hailstorm of bullets.

Cash: Not true. No one will intervene--I

promise it is just you and me.

Buck: You and me and ten of your gunmen. Fuck

you, Hefe, I ain’t buying the snake oil.

Cash: You are a lot of things, Buck, but I never 

thought you were a coward.

Buck: Are you kidding me? Are you challenging me

to a fistfight in the middle of a gun battle?

Cash: Damn rights. I’ll break your neck with my

bare hands!

Buck: Thor and I bare-knuckled it one time--how

did that work out?

Cash: I’m not Thor.

Buck: Neither is he.

12(sound cue) the metallic sound of cartridges being 

rammed into hot cylinders, above and below the stairs

over jazz brushing and harmonica huffing.

13(close-up) Cash yelling: I tell you it’s you and me, you

chickenshit back-shooting split-tongue buffalo-fucking

bastard!!!

Silence.

14(voice-over) Hey, big man, I got a present for you,

come and get it!

Glenn Buttkus

Posted over at d'Verse Poet's Pub

Five Hematoma Deep

image by Glenn Buttkus

 Five Hematoma Deep

“One can find so many pains when the rain

is falling.”--John Steinbeck

It was a sparkling

Spring day. all fresh cut grass,

and squirrels playing tag.

Contrails from a jet speck

put white ruts in a ceylon sky.

I strolled out onto our deck.

Our family pooch, Taffy,

had passed months before.

Her old dog house

was still in the corner.

There was a handmade wooden sign,

carved by my youngest daughter,

nailed to it--TAFFY.

I decided to take a picture

of it for posterity.

I stepped back, and framed the shot.

Just as I snapped it,

a weak board I was standing on

broke, and my right leg

crashed down into the hole,

all the way to the thigh.

The gash was only as wide

as the 2X4 that had broken.

My leg was much wider.

It was jammed and stuck

in the smashed wood

and tiny orifice.

There was no one around,

so I tugged at it with all my strength.

Finally it came loose as tendons

and wood shards screamed.

The thigh muscle had a several inch wide divot

in it. It felt like a hungry troll was

gnawing on it.

An hour later, at the ER,

we found no wound, just contusion

and severe bruising. Unfortunately

what was unseen was the five

levels of hematoma lurking

below the skin. The next day

it became a profuse bleeding wound.

I set up shop at a wound clinic

for the next several months.

Finally I had to wear a wound pump

for a long week. It took seven months

to heal. The only positive thing

that came out of it was we built

a stronger, more modern covered deck,

and we enjoy it often.

I carry

a half inch 

permanent divot

to remind me 

of the ordeal.

Glenn Buttkus

Posted over at d'Verse Poet's Pub

Fat Man

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 Fat Man 

“I have become Death, the destroyer of worlds.”

--Robert Oppenheimer.

On August 9, 1945, a B-29 named Bock’s Car led

a bomber group over Japan. The Enola Gay flew

with them having dropped Little Boy on Hiroshima

three days before. Bock’s Car carried Fat Man, a

plutonium atomic bomb 40% more powerful than

Little Boy. 

Their target was Kokura, but bad weather ruined

visibility. So it was on to the secondary target,

Nagasaki. At 11:02am, Fat Man was unleashed.

It detonated at 1,650 feet. Within a blast radius

of a square mile 40,000 people were vaporized.

Horrific burns and radiation poisoning would

later take the lives of 80,000 more.

In 1946, Kyoko stood amongst the blackened

forest of a city park. With tears in her eyes, and

radiation in her bones, she said,”What are the 

roots that clutch, what branches grow out of this

stony rubble?”. 

Glenn Buttkus

Prosery

Posted over at  d'Verse Poet's Pub

Everybody Must Get Stoned

 

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Everybody Must Get Stoned

“Some days are diamonds, and some days

are stones.”--Neal Gaiman.

I spent my

whole youth,

turning over stones;

gathering and

polishing them.

Stones

haunt history.

David slew Goliath

with one.

Sisyphus

rolled one

uphill for an eternity.

Lazarus 

watched

as Jesus moved

that boulder

off his tomb

with two words,

Rise Up!

Say Hallelujah!

Glenn Buttkus

Quadrille

Posted over at d'Verse Poet's Pub