Day 59

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Day 59

“Do onto others twenty-five percent better than

you expect them to do onto you.”

--Linus Pauling    Born February 28, 1901

The last gasp of February is in a dogtrot,

heard Dale Robertson died over on CNN;

somebody got busy picking out his grass-plot.

Pope Benedict XVI will today begin

life as pope emeritus, not soon forgot,

just plain priest Joe Ratzinger once again.

ATF thugs attacked Branch Davidians with buckshot

because devil-dog Koresh was hiding within;

slaying with fire--other solutions not sought.

Remembering our Nisqually Earthquake without chagrin,

thankful we eluded the lethal shaking slip-knot

that hit Iran, killing 3,000 that day therein.

Dupont in ’35 discovered nylon, creating a sexpot

society, making curvy calves so very hot.

Glenn Buttkus

February 28, 2013

Posted over on dVerse Poets FFA  

This is a variation on the Sonnet, 4 tercets followed by a couplet.

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Horizontal Bopping

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Horizontal Bopping

“Each of us can manifest the properties of a

field of consciousness that transcends space,

time, and linear causality.”--Stanislav Grof

Life is linear,

with inception as crowned vanguard,

& deterioration as

destination, creating a

vibrant colorful mosaic, a throbbing

kaleidoscope, a series 

of devious gilded

dust bunnies, kenneled in brass

pots, tucked under

beds, stacked in 

teetering tall piles in the

corner, hidden in

closets, sequestered in

broken shoe boxes, saved in

forgotten family albums,

treasured within folds

of red velvet, gift-wrapped tightly

in tissue paper.

***********************

Death is the

impudent speck of counterpoint, egress

as extinguishment, our

imminent arrival at

Critical Mass, having traveled inexorably

from birth of

a planet to

the death of a star;

the magical transition

another face, a

different roof, a parallel dimensional

 and domicidal shift 

with different doorways 

for each of us, windowless,

wiped of numerals.

*****************************

Death as lover

lies with mold on bread crust,

with the fish

on dirty ice,

with bloody steaks piled up

neatly in shrink--

wrapped pinkish lines,

with the flowers cut and

ready to wither,

with the polished

color-injected fruit placed perfectly

in supermarket bins;

everything waiting for

the passionate embrace of many

mouths, mighty molars

reducing it to

grist, paste, & slivers before

rot robs its

beauty, rendering it

sustenance for carrion, for pets,

whose alimentary components

are impervious to

the several varieties of carcinogens

deep within it;

harbored, hidden, but

obviously still a beast at

bay, restrained, tethered,

muzzled, yet never

eradicated, excommunicated, banished, forsaken, broken

beyond its voracity. 

Glenn Buttkus

February 2013

Posted over on dVerse Poets OLN

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Gloaming Gustari

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Gloaming Gustari

“The early morning has gold in its mouth.”

--Benjamin Franklin

For several years I rose bleary-eyed

and resolute to the eerie sounds

of soft silence being pierced by 

night birds squawking, flying

wing to wing with the bats,

and the lonesome barking of dogs;

struggling into the pre-twilight, wrapped

in striped muffler and navy-blue watch-cap,

having to wipe the steam from my spectacles

before hearing the evening’s freeze crackle

as I forced my car door open, the sonorous

screech of a blood-red ice scraper clearing

the windshield, the blinded rear-view mirrors,

and the driver’s window;

serenaded by classical music while shivering

in wait for the engine to percolate the radiator tea

and add purpose to the whoosh of defroster

on a windshield trying to re-form its icy mask;

sliding into gear, headlights on bright, breaking

the myriad of frozen sheets on puddles, emerging

at the head of the alley to make my familiar way

down quiet frosted streets, past dark houses

and slumbering occupants, out onto the wide

nearly empty stretch of freeway, allowing

me to drive faster, deep into the icy arms

of thick brown fog, past the district fenced lot

full of pencil-yellow school buses;

soon arriving at work, hiking 

from the empty parking stalls

across a wide stretch of tall firs 

throwing patchwork shadows 

for me to scurry through, 

past several buildings 

pale white from a harvest moon, 

it’s silver beams dancing on my breath

as I unlocked a side door and let myself

into a dimly-lit long hallway leading to

my office, where my government computer

hummed good morning, ready for

my exploration,

my excursions on line, 

my research, 

my poetry, 

spending several delicious hours 

before other employees

arrived at their duty stations, 

before sweet old blinded veterans 

would gather at my door needing 

my expertise, attention,

and compassion;

later even while mired in teaching, deep

in some technical explication, still

I savored the cached residue of joy

that remained within, the result

of being up before the dawn,

sailing like a solitary sailor 

on a sargasso cyber-sea

smiling leeward just before 

the new sun poked its fiery pate

above the awaiting fecund horizon-

greeting it boldly, more

than prepared for the

carpe diem,

quam minimum credula postero.

Glenn Buttkus

February 2013

Posted over on dVerse Poets--Poetics

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Graffiato

street art by Banksy

Graffiato

“Art begins with resistance--at the point

where resistance is overcome.”--Andre Gide

For a good time call Kathy at FU2-666, 

scratched with a pocket knife while someone 

was taking a crap in a latrine stall 

in the bus station in 1958,

mixed in with copious pornographic cryptic messages

and crude drawings of sexual organs,

I love to suck dick & 

I take it up the ass;

this was my introduction to graffiti 

as my 12 year old hormones began

to rage & my mind reeled.

Graff has been with us since the cave glyphs.

They have found figure drawings & inscriptions

on Turkish temples, synagogues, ancient sepulchers,

on tombs, ruins, in the Catacombs of Rome,

and magma-scorched onto the stones of Pompeii;

disappointed lovers scribbling,

“I want to break Venus’s ribs with a club

and deform her hips.”--

a huge phallus with accompanying words,

“Mansueta Tene”--handle with care,

the young Michelangelo and Raphael were taggers,

painting their names with others in the ruins

of Nero’s Domus Aurea;

heart shapes and handprints connotated 

the proximity of a brothel,

Love For Sale.

The Mayans & Aztecs did it.

The Vikings did it.

The Crusaders did it.

The Mongol hordes did it.

American soldiers did it

on foreign city walls

and on the sides of their bombers,

tanks, and jeeps.

Street Art has developed rapidly

as a complex art form, whose validity

or value is contested highly & reviled by many,

while being appreciated, respected, 

& cherished by others.

Too often it is done without permission,

done hurriedly, breaking the law, done

defiantly, brazenly on buildings, in alleys,

on railroad box cars, subways,

& under bridges,

moving from scatological roots

to declarations of love, of territory,

political slogans, famous literary quotes,

various forms of protestation, 

sometimes with DC & Marvel comic book

or Hollywood movie themes,

“Dick Nixon before he dicks you.”

The new artists have monikers like

Skeme, Dondi, MinOne, Zephr,

Blek Le Rat, & Mr. Brainwash,

using spray paint cans & marking pens

to perform the Pissing of pigment,

done with refillable fire extinguishers,

Throw Ups and Bombing

where garish images are painted quickly,

Rolling or Blockbusters

as huge paintings prevent other artists

from sharing the space,

and the complex Wildstyling,

where letters & images interlock;

and of course Stenciling,

like the popular Banksy art.

Personally I prefer the work done lovingly,

with the permission of the property owner,

vast beautiful murals that fully manage

to enhance the quality of our lives;

let’s have less besmirching, belittling, bullying,

braggadocio, degrading or impugning;

for God’s sake let us celebrate life,

not glorify chaos or violence. 

Glenn Buttkus

February 2013 

Posted over on dVerse Poets MTB

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Nymph

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Nymph 

“One should lie empty, open, choice-less as a beach--

waiting for a gift from the sea.” --Anne Morrow Lindbergh

His most cherished

moment, after banishment from fog,

bathed in golden

afternoon sunshine was

watching her strolling along the

neck of that

black beach, still

slick with the wondrous wetness

of outgoing tide;

silhouetted tiny against

the girth of the nearest

largest sea stack,

at the base

of a tall rock, where

a lone fisherman

stood like a

cardboard cut-out, grasping his

big saltwater pole,

with the sunlight

dancing around him on waves,

rippled by wind.

She stood poised,

as she considered dashing between

the receding waters,

and then decided

against it, quicksilver frozen in

a blue tableau,

perched like a

white heron stilted on driftwood logs,

before taking flight,

as he finally

understood her love for the

sea, the forces

that pulled her

from the city regularly, letting

her run free

on ocean beaches,

wandering, meditating, wading, waiting to

salute the sunset.

Glenn Buttkus

February 2013.

This Collum Lune posted over on dVerse Poets OLN

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The Stacks

image by navin sarma


The Stacks

“I’ve always considered myself a minor writer.

My province is small, but I try to explore it

very, very thoroughly.”--Leonard Cohen

Thick fog clung like a cobweb

to that narrow couple of miles of coast

near Kalaloch, as we enjoyed a sunny

snippet of Indian summer, carrying

our picnic in a pink cooler out onto

a grassy bluff above the beach, tossing

a red tartan blanket over the lone park table,

trying to explain to our girls how a grove

of misshapen tree giants formed their burls.

Munching our apple & pineapple slices,

turkey sandwiches & sugar cookies,

we sat transfixed in soft silence,

drawn to the sibilance of the big surf,

never tiring of the eternal drama of waves

swelling, cresting, and pounding onto a beach

where sea salt, and broken colorful shells

were sprinkled on the gray-brown sand

like wild seasoning;

adorned with bleached Picasso-like twisted piles

of driftwood snakes, dragons, and ships of war,

bound up by fat shiny kelp whips, bent

around each other like Holocaust victims

in their killing pits, pausing patiently for 

varying degrees of petrification, gleefully awaiting

our pliant fingers to pluck some of them up,

rub them clean, and transport them inland

to reside within the sweetness of our garden.

A few short miles up the shore it seemed

that nothing could have prepared me for

the raw exhilaration of my first glimpse

of Ruby Beach, its steep trail dark with mud,

dropping like a sleeping lizard down through

a thick fringe of forest, the path continuing

past massive mausoleums & headstones of wood,

transitioning from large gravel to pea gravel

to a long naked stretch of slick black sand,

girdled with tall granite cliffs, that had wide jagged

crevices slashed deep within them, making

their edges resemble raised stone hands

with their fat ferrous fingers extending to heaven;

with seal caves and eel bore-holes carved

by the sea at their mossy bases;

all magnificent & mesmerizing, 

yet paled to nothing

when compared to the huge rock fists

that were the sea stacks, thrusting up

out of the soaked sand like biblical towers,

dotted with crewcut sea grass and short

hardy trees that were wind-bent

like old beach dwarves, and covered

with clouds of nesting gulls & terns;

magical monoliths standing alone off shore,

in ragged Neptunian squads up and down

the coast, survivors, as the fury of the ocean

had clawed at the cliffs for eons, and the stacks

just refused to go down, to erode, to bend a knee;

and one cannot ever gaze upon them without

being cheered by their defiance, 

being respectful of their heroics,

being awed by their beauty,

and transferring some of their tenacity

to the core of tensions brought

to that beach, and then left there

to deteriorate and blow back out

over busy waves.

Glenn Buttkus

February 2013

Posted over at dVerse Poets-Poetics

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Vitriolic Valentine

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Vitriolic Valentine

“We are each of us angels with only one wing,

and we can only fly by embracing one another.”

--Lucretius

I rose up rambunctious this morning,

raging & ranting against the machine,

cranky as a bruin with boils, wanting,

demanding answers, closure, results,

pernicious pounds of flesh,

positive pieces of mind, succor

or at least some modicum of

verisimilitude.

Tell me why

does the wind whine like a whimsical

weather-bitch in Wimbledon while

professionals are attempting

to tend to serious tennis?

Will we as a species ever

experience global peace?

Because nobody negates

the numbing notion that all nations

need a nicer way to wage war;

for human nature is just too

naturally bellicose to embrace it.

Let me tell you, as a member

of the morbidly obese, if

one weighs two tons, and just

cannot surmount or control hunger,

it’s like riding a Brahma bull hand’s free--

so damn it, what dip-shit doesn’t dent decorum

while fasting off the fat?

My neighbor’s garage rafters are riddled

with rabid rats, while only slim yards away,

as our Keezie cat stands vigil, we do hope

our gentle garage will never become

a similar rodent sanctuary. 

My silver Suzuki SUV doesn’t like

living outside in the in-climate weather

while my wife’s cute hybrid Camry

rests snug & warm within

our one-car garage, but my

vehicular pal patiently puts up

with the designated disrespect.

Our tomcat complains loudly

if I am too slow to feed him,

and the tawdry tale he tells

me wife is niggard nonsense.

By mid-morning I had to accept

the fatuous fact that I could never

pick out all the bucolic burrs

under my shepherd’s saddle,

so I soon found myself clicked into Facebook

searching out serious romantic images

to share with my spouse, who

would most certainly just delete them,

dismissing my gesture as silly

& sentimental tokens of distaff devotion,

but I do know she will probably

enjoy the garrulous gesture.

Glenn Buttkus

February 14, 2013

Posted over on dVerse Poets FFA

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