Monday, September 30, 2019

Kafka Sunrise




image from pinterest.com


Kafka Sunrise

“I cannot make anyone understand what is 
happening inside me.”--Franz Kafka.

One morning, years ago, I awoke to an odd
clicking noise. As I localized the sound, I
realized that it was more of a crazed crunching,
and that it was coming from my left ear. I
panicked a bit--did I have a punctured ear drum?
Then the noise stopped. I had my wife look at
my ear. She found nothing. 

The crunching sound would come and go. 
Sometimes it would get very loud, then subside. 
It became surreal, like a Kafka daydream. I 
imagined a tick or a spider burrowing in my cheek.

That night, I couldn’t sleep. The noise became 
maddening. Then suddenly it began to itch. I
turned the lamp on just in time to greet an ant
emerging out of the quagmire of ear wax. It
dropped into my hand. I took it outside and
released it. It had earned its freedom.

Last June, beneath deck stairs,
hundreds of tiny black spider’s
eggs hatched babies.



Glenn Buttkus

Haibun

Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub

Thursday, September 26, 2019

Love Is



painting by Elena Kotliarker.


Love Is

“I love you simply, without problems or pride; so
intimate that when I fall asleep your eyes close.”
--Pablo Neruda.

Love is magma muscle,
the vertex of the flesh husk
we choose to inhabit.

Love is the engineer
that directs the plethora of emotions,
the executive producer
for the daily broadcast
we consider as our life.

Love can, and perhaps must,
overpower the darker impulses,
can smooth them out,
even eradicate them.

If love were a hormone,
it would spring from the heart,
treating it like a railroad round house,
providing for itself several routes of egress.

Love is not lust, not greed or avarice
or selfishness--no, it is the antithesis
of these;        selflessness,
                      vulnerability,
                      integrity,
                      honesty,
                      near transparency

Love can be too often misunderstood,
misinterpreted, misaligned and misused
by a sweet tooth,
     an erection,
     ego, preferences
     and inhibition.

Life can be reduced to mathematics.
Love can combine math and heart emissions,
and provide startling solutions
to problems, diplomacy, negotiations
and relationships.
Love can be the departure & the destination
                     the before and the after,
                     the darkness and the light,
                     the reason d’etre,
                     or Cupid’s curse.

Jesus wept,
out of love
and the lack of it.



Glenn Buttkus

Metaphors

Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub

Tuesday, September 24, 2019

Under the Sea




image from cesdeals.com


Under the Sea

“I usually solve problems by letting them
devour me.”--Franz Kafka.

Penny Plankton could not swim against
the current.
Sam Sardine gobbled up Penny and her pals.
Sam smiled at his good fortune.
Bradford Bass munched up Sam easily, but
Bradford was still hungry.
Then Timothy Tuna swallowed Bradford whole.
Timothy was happy with his feast.
Sidney Seal scarfed up Timothy in three bites.
Sidney giggled because of his wonderful lunch.
Olivia Orca devoured Sidney while he slept.
Olivia shared her meal with her two calves.
Walter Gray Whale ate up Olivia in one big bite.
Walter felt like the Sultan of the Sea,
for he was the biggest creature under the waves.
Nothing was big enough to eat him.
Mister Morton was a professional whaler,
and he harpooned Walter last week.

All these events may seem cruel or sad,
but this is Nature’s Way,
and we cannot change it.



Glenn Buttkus

Children's poem

Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub

Wednesday, September 18, 2019

Blackthorne--Episode 101




image from pulpcovers.com


Blackthorne

Cinemagenic 101

Bushwhackers

“Some fell by laudanum, some by steel, and
death by ambush lurked in every shadow.”
--Samuel Garth .

1(sound cue) coronet and breaking glass.
2(medium close-up) Johnny heard the glass break.
3(cut to second story window in the main house)
a brigand had smashed the window with a rifle.
4(one-shot) The Eagle swung the hot barrel of
his Winchester around just as another shot tore
into the tree; splinters stabbed into his shoulder.
In the same moment Johnny got off two shots
in the direction of the figure in the window.
5(sound cue) saxophone and piano.
6(cut back) to the second story window. The
gunny standing there fell face first, breaking
more of the glass. His body hung like a limp
scarecrow, slashed to ribbons by the glass,
and shot in the head and chest.
7(sound cue) bass drum and banjo.
8(medium wide shot) the barn began to smoke.
The tall red double doors swung open and a dun
mule rushed out, followed by two men, firing as
they ran.
9(overhead crane shot) Johnny firing from behind
the tree, and the two bushwhackers scrambling
across the open space between the barn and the
bunkhouse.
10(medium close-up) Johnny firing three times,
his lever action a blur.
11(two shot) the back-shooters kicking up dust
as they sprinted. One of Johnny’s bullets hit the
slower one in the leg, but both men made it to
safety past the east side of the bunkhouse.
12(wide shot) the barn began to burn
13( voice over) Rojo chinche assholes! 
14(sound cue) guitar and French horn over
horses screaming.
15(tighten wide shot) flames begin to lick
around the doors.
16(voice over continues) They burn the fucking
barn--Bob and Red are still in there! Damn it,
Buck, where are you? Bronson has sent half of
his men, and they burn our horses!
17(sound cue) horses screaming and kicking
their stalls.
18(cut back to the main house) black smoke was 
billowing out the window, over the head of the 
dead wrangler.
19(sound cue) horses galloping over blues guitar.
20( medium close-up ) Johnny whirled around,
looking behind him.
21(overhead drone traveling shot) Rod Buck was
racing down the west road, slapping leather, alone
in the carriage. Cheewa was running alongside.
Johnny’s heart rose to his throat, and his wounds
did not hurt any more.
22(medium wide shot) the black carriage came in
with its red wheels spinning, Firing from under the
porch, the wood shed and the bunkhouse tore holes
in the rig’s canvas cover. Thirty yards from Johnny
the sniper under the porch dropped one of the
palominos in its traces. The horse went down,
tripping his companion beside him, jerking it off
balance, and it went down too. Buck jumped from 
the carriage as it snapped its leathers and flipped
over onto its side.
23(tight one shot) Buck landed on his feet, going
into a shoulder roll to break his fall. As he rolled,
two shots puffed up in the dirt where he had just
been. He fired his sawed off at the man under the
front porch. A four foot section of thatch burst into
splinters. At the same time the Thunderer barked
in his right hand, spraying lead across the front
of the bunkhouse. He rolled to safety behind the
overturned carriage. One of the horses had got
to its knees, and it was complaining loudly. The
firing ceased.
24(sound cue) violin, banjo and harmonica.
25( tight one-shot) Buck lie flat against the ground.
He peeked at the wood shed and bunkhouse
through the wagon spokes. The barn was fully
aflame. The main house belched smoke from
its second floor. Flames appeared from the north
side of the house.



Glenn Buttkus

Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub OLN

Tuesday, September 17, 2019

Prom Night




image from pinterest.com 


Prom Night

“We must let go of the life we have planned, so as
to accept the one that is waiting for us.”
--Joseph Campbell.

It was Prom Night.
Rob sat there with his hands in his lap,
holding the corsage.
He was 18, and was there
to pick up Miss Kathy King.

Her father sat across from him
glowering, his arms folded.
Rob had been going steady
with Kath all year,
an eternity in high school time.
He would have liked to fold his arms too,
and make eye contact with Mr. King,
but the young man understood
the courting ritual.

Mr. King was a prominent banker,
and Rob was from a blue collar family.
Kathy’s Dad kept staring
at the modest ill-fitting suit
the boy wore; it was his father’s.
His folks had warned him
about dating a girl from a wealthy family,
but young love disavows
all barriers to its fruition.

Finally Kathy descended the stairs
in her lavender evening gown.
She was a vision of blond cheerleader ecstasy.
He presented her with the compulsory corsage.
Her mother pinned it on her.

Her little sister came out to join the parents.
Her mother told them to have fun.
Her father reminded them of the midnight curfew. 
The kids stood for a picture, waved, smiled,
and rushed out to Rob’s red 1955 Chev Bel Air
convertible.

He opened the passenger door for her.
Her starched petticoats swished
as she pulled them into the car.
As he walked to the driver’s side
he fantasized about “going all the way”
with her, as she had promised.

The Chevy V-8 lit up, the glass packs rumbled
as they pulled away from the curb.
Rob glanced into the rear view mirror;
the little sister was waving good-bye.
The kids giggled nervously.
The waiting for this evening was over.

A half mile away a delivery truck rushed
toward its destination. At the intersection
of Maple & Main, Rob, distracted, entered
the intersection without looking both ways.
The speeding truck T-boned them
on the passenger side.

Kathy was killed instantly.
Rob broke his spine, but survived.
Now a new kind of waiting began,
as the terrible memories raged
like a wildfire in his heart. 



Glenn Buttkus

Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub

Monday, September 16, 2019

Forest of Evil




painting by Behshad Arjomandi.


Forest of Evil

In the darkness of the forest near Vlad’s castle,
the stench of evil has saturated the tender bark
of aspen and birch. The trees became barren.
Last Fall, as the leaves dropped, they were the
last signs of life

The bubbling brook that fed the trees was
poisoned, because of the thousands of corpses
dumped into the creek near the Castle. The water
turned gray, the pebbles turned red. When Spring
arrived the trees could not blossom. Their bark
became black with a deathly ooze.They began to
lean over, their spines broken. Their spindly 
branches intertwined into a bulwark of sharp 
brambles.

First the birds left, except for those who feast on
carrion. Then the animals fled. Soon villages were
abandoned. Years later people asked what had
happened in these woods, but no one knew the
answer because those memories were left here
with the trees.


Glenn Buttkus

Prosery

Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub

Uncelebrated




image from fineartamerica.com
painting by Igor Postash.


Uncelebrated 

“It’s hard to hold the hand of anyone who is 
reaching for the sky just to surrender.”
--Leonard Cohen.

I’ve had several English teachers advise me to
become a writer--but none of them advised me to
become a poet or an actor; two pursuits that
provide succor and heartbreak. I, of course,
became both. I, also, out of necessity, became a
teacher, which paid the bills.

By 1974, I had written two novels--an existential
Western, BLACKTHORNE, and a detective novel,
BAERBAK, placed in Seattle. I submitted them both
for publication. No one was ready for them. I was
advised to write non-fiction. Damn it, I don’t want to
be paid to write--I want to be paid for what I write.

I looked into self-publishing, but I had too much anger
and pride to follow through. I rationalized that to be
published was no big deal; there’s always the internet; 
a select pool of readers. At 75, I can live with that.


Glenn Buttkus

Prosery: Leonard Cohen, Book of Longing

Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub

Thursday, September 12, 2019

Bitch by the Bay




image from Delta Flight Museum


Bitch by the Bay

“A bitch is the opposite of a whore. A bitch does
not need anybody--or at least that’s what she
would like people to think.”
--Saint Paul Trois Chateaux.

I was born in Seattle,
on Flag Day, a few minutes
past midnight in 1944.

Growing up, learning
the city by hopping
like a gypsy locust
from suburb to suburb,
I became very proud
of my seven-hilled city,
like a throned monarch
hemmed in by parallel mountain ranges,
and teeming port
for our inland sea of Puget Sound,
with its dozen lush islands,
served by a fleet of super ferries.

When I was twelve,
I began to take buses
into the heart of downtown,
to see movies,
to people watch,
and to marvel at the eclectic mix
of modern and pioneer buildings,
watched over by the Smith Tower,
the tallest building east
of the Mississippi.

Seattle became a part of me,
of who I was, and who I’d become.
It felt like Eden before the fall,
like Rome at its peak, full
of artists and intellectuals
like Paris in the 20’s.

I spent a couple of years
in San Diego in the Navy
in the mid-60’s.
Seattle was a joy to come home to,
all opened-armed, wild wet kisses
and blow jobs on a regular basis.

I returned to Southern California
in the mid-70’s, as an actor, 
all starry-eyed, naive and vulnerable. 
LA hardened my edges, 
and smashed my rosy glasses.
Acting was replaced by Teaching.
By the early 80’s I pined
for deep green forests,
snow-capped fire-mountains,
and vivid memories of the past.
So I headed North again.

But Seattle did not welcome me
this time. It had become
a place to chase ghosts,
a place of a spiraling cost of living,
a place of a dozen new skyscrapers,
and a gaggle of confusing freeways.

Seattle took on the role
of bitter ex-wife, who remarried
for money, who belittled my cherished
memories, who would not even
acknowledge me in public.

I’ll tell you what--when an ex-lover becomes
a haughty bitch, there’s nothing to do
but break up with her, find
another lover, and make
a new home.


Glenn Buttkus

Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub

Tuesday, September 10, 2019

Lunatic Fringe




image from metalarchive.com


Lunatic Fringe

“The people who are crazy enough to believe they
can change the world, are the ones that do.”
--Rob Siltanen.

I am aware
that madness
can be a demon
that devours and scars
the victimized Self;
and it chews slowly
so that you can appreciate
its sharp yellow teeth.

I wear my anger
like a hair shirt.
Some days
everything and everybody
makes me mad.
I am capable
of leaping into rages
that are terrifying,
even for me.

I was in the Service
during Viet Nam.
I was careful
to keep myself out
of the combat zone,
because I feared
if I got used to
killing people, 
a real madness
would envelop me,
then I’d get a taste for it,
would enjoy the killing;
madness would ride me
like a lethal leech,
and I would never
shake it off.
I would be its bitch.


My own father,
returning from combat
during WWII,
never got over
his severe PTSD.

I prefer embracing
the flip side of madness,
what Kazantzakis gave to Zorba:
We all need a little madness,
otherwise we can’t cut the rope
and be free--
what Robin Williams gave to comedy:
You’re only given
a little spark of madness.
You mustn’t lose it.

I have often wondered
if the truly mad
are aware of their madness?
They say that 75% of us
could use some mental health 
counseling. I don’t know.
It all sounds Dinky Dau to me,
some #10 prime bullshit,
as Charlie used to say.



Glenn Buttkus

Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub

Monday, September 9, 2019

In the Nick




Nick Fury--art by Jim Steranko


In the Nick

“Yesterday is history, tomorrow a mystery--only
today makes a difference.”--Nick Saban.

There was a tick
named Nick,
and his favorite trick
was to nick folks
in the neck,
making his escape
in the nick of time;
nicknamed Slick Nick.

Reindeer on the roof
in August, looks like Old Saint Nick
let them off the leash. 



Glenn Buttkus

Quadrille--exactly 44

Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub

Thursday, September 5, 2019

Dogtown




image from pinterest.com


Dogtown

In Dogtown, fire ants are ground into the chili.
Weasels collect debt when payments are due.
Collies adore you, and would never desert
you. A platypus smartly attired in just plain
plaid, put together an all-tuba band,
performing for workers at Boeing’s tool & dye

shops. Badgers make colorful tie-dye
shirts that turtles wear when they’re chilly.
Ordinances are enforced by a helmeted band
of Alabama termites, lips lathered in dew,
where centipedes can fly passenger planes
and snakes love fly larva for dessert.

Where cacti bloom deep blue in the desert.
Lady bugs are too bored to properly dye
table clothes, so all the tables are very plain.
Those killer bees all buzzed in from Chile.
The naughty angry mice must never do
as rats have done--that rotten rodent band.

Koalas put together a hard rock band,
but most fall asleep, or just desert
the group. It’s sad when the rent’s due.
Mortician moles want folks to hurry and die.
Whacko wasps create the hottest chili.
Lots of buses, trains, and squadrons of planes

visit. Bulldog spinsters have faces too plain
to please, so they wear pink rubber bands,
making snouts pucker up, aloof and chilly.
Pugs like kitty roca as cat box dessert.
Deputy Dawg promises he will never die.
Slugs like French-licking the bubbly dew.

The Emu strongly state, “We just wont do
what’s right.”--making it abundantly plain.
Hornets created intricate nests with tool & dye
workers, that terribly uppity and arrogant band.
South of city limits were the dunes of the desert. 
Over City Hall flaps the flag of Chile.

Residents know what to do, just form a band.
Then plane off losers, forcing them to desert.
Music does not wilt or die, whether hot or chilly.



Glenn Buttkus

Sestina

posted over at dVerse Poets Pub

Wednesday, September 4, 2019

Blackthorne--Episode 100




image from pinterest.com


Blackthorne

Cinemagenic One-Hundred

Onslaught

“Guard yourself as you may, every moment could
be an ambush.”--Cormac McCarthy.

1(sound cue) Indian branch flute & harmonica.
2(medium wide shot from overhead drone)
the late afternoon musk-melon sun was beginning
to slide behind the ranch house. Johnny was near
the bottom of the hill.
3(cut to medium close up) The sun was in the
Eagle’s eyes. He pulled his hat down a little.
4(tight close-up) Johnny stopped.
5(sound cue) cicadas, chickens, and the breeze
went silent. A rifle shot thundered across the yard.
6(sound cue) loud six-string blues guitar slide and
riffs over bass drum heartbeats.
7(one shot) He moved the second he heard the shot,
but it was a second too late. A bullet caught him just
above the left knee and spun him to the ground. He
rolled into some high grass,and peeped over the top.
Nothing moved.
8(close-up) Johnny’s eyes darting left & right.
9(rising crane shot) from the top of the grass to a wide
shot of the house. The sun was behind the house now,
and long shadows reached out to him like phantom
fingers. A man darted out of the front door and cut
quickly to the right, heading for the corner. Johnny’s
30-30 slug tore wood off the siding just above the 
man’s head, as the brigand dipped out of sight. 
Someone else fired from behind hay bales in the
first corral, knocking the Indian’s hat off.
10(cut to medium close-up) Johnny picking up the
hat, and poking a finger through the bullet hole:
Bastardo.
11(sound cue) coronet, guitar, and castanets.
12(medium wide one-shot) Johnny returned fire,
slamming rifle lead into the bales, limping and
running as he fired, going for the big tree in the
middle of the yard. He was four feet from it when
a slug knocked him down. Bicho--he crawled.
Cabron--he rolled, until he made it to the tree.
There was three large rocks near the trunk of
the tree that gave him cover. Two wounds
screamed for his attention, left knee and right
forearm. He pulled off the red bandana from
his pate, and wrapped the forearm, tying it
tightly. He was bloodied as if he had been 
gored by angry bulls. He flicked out a dozen
shells from his bandolero, and stacked them
by his elbow.
13(sound cue) saxophone squeak, electric 
guitar and snare drums.
14(medium close-up) From three directions,
bark was flying off the tree, inches from his
head.
15(jump cut) A dozen horses were stampeded
out of the larger stock pen, and they panic-
galloped south to the brown mesas.
16(cut to a close-up) Johnny: I told you! Carajo--
I told you they would come! Hijo de puta--and
here the fuck they are! ...firing at the side of
the house. 
17(sound cue--Voice Over) During a lull:
OK, the wood shed or maybe the bunkhouse,
in the corral behind hay bales, and a forro now
under the front porch--three, maybe four.
18(medium close-up) a bullet tore the heel off
his left boot. A man darted out of the hay loft
door. Bronson, you sonofabitch. Five! You sent
five goddamn men--but you will not kill me!
19(one-shot) Johnny fired twice at the barn
hay loft door.
20(cut to medium shot) the bullets hit a couple
feet to the right of the door.
21(sound cue) wood splintering, then a slug
hitting flesh.
22(close-up) Johnny reloading, shiny brass sliding
into the Winchester magazine.
23(crane shot) the guy behind the hay bales fired
three times in rapid succession, ripping off sappy
bark twice and recocheting off the rock once.
24(medium close-up) behind Johnny as he held his 
open sights on the spot the gunman had been. When
the assassin bobbed up, 30-30 expanding lead gave
him a lobotomy, splattering his brains.



Glenn Buttkus

Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub OLN

Tuesday, September 3, 2019

Blue Hooves




painting by Beverly Dyer


Blue Hooves

“Nevada is home to more wild horses than all the
other states combined.”--Jon Porter.

A family of mustangs,
a stallion,
two mares
and a colt
galloped along a dry river bed,
kicking up
dry acrid borax dust,
billowing beneath their unshod hooves.

They roamed the
southwestern Nevada foothills
as some of the last wild horses
in the country;
wearing no man’s brand,
unbroken,
unfettered,
free.

They were being chased
by out-of-work cowboys
in flat beds and pick ups;
one driver
bouncing over sagebrush
and prairie dog holes,
another poke in back of the truck,
whirling a blood-soaked lasso
over his head--15 feet
of rope lashed to an old truck tire.

The engines roared,
the cowboys whooped,
and the wicked lariats
hummed a lethal tune 
as they sliced through
the cold morning air.

The black stallion was the fastest.
One of the mares kept up with him;
the other mare and the colt
were falling behind.

There was a pursuing truck
on each high side
of the river of sand
and a jacked-up Ram V-8 
closing on the stragglers.
The stallion, 
a veteran of these chases ,
was headed for a hidden arroyo
that was too narrow
for the trucks to follow.

The black Ram
pulled within throwing distance
and the wrangler tossed the singing loop.
It was a perfect toss,
settling around the neck of the mare.
The rope tightened
and the truck tire anchor
flew out the back.

The mare continued to run,
towing the tire
that jumped and dragged behind.
The colt was confused
and it tripped over the tire
and fell down
The angry Dodge crunched its brakes,
and skidded to a stop
as another rope found the yearling’s neck.

The drama played out, 
always the same script,
man the victor,
horses choked by ropes .
The colt would become
some child’s first horse,
and the mare would take up residence
in a can of dog food.



Glenn Buttkus

Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub

Monday, September 2, 2019

Union, Union




image from IMDb.com


Union, Union

What’s wrong? Easy. One--working conditions are
bad. Two--they’re bad because the mob does the
hiring. Three--things will not improve until we stop
the mob from getting away with murder .” 
--Karl Malden: ON THE WATERFRONT.

We celebrate Labor Day on the first Monday in
September. Oregon was the first state to do so 
in 1884. Summer unofficially has closure. Children
have to return to the regiment of public education.
We anticipate the first Monday in October when
the Supreme Court reconvenes, as RBG attends;
hurrah.

Sadly, labor unions can be a blessing or a curse.
In 1900, we worked 12 hours a day, 6 days a week.
We didn’t see an 8 hour day until 1916. Like in a
bad marriage, we believe that we can’t do without
them, or we’d be at the mercy of heartless greedy
employers. Yet Jimmy Hoffa, and others, have
shown us how to corrupt unions. The mob can get
involved. Too often worker’s pensions have been
stolen or dissolved. Strikes are called, and terrible
violence can erupt led by bought thugs and cops.
We are forced back to work without much gain, if
any. 

Add to that the civil servants are prohibited to
strike, as a teacher, after several strikes, there was
no cost of living raise for a decade. Today, modern
technology, CGI, AI, and robotics are replacing
millions of workers--not the immigrants recently
arrived. I fear the 21st Century may be the death
knell for labor unions. Labor Day parades will be
done by robots and androids.

Hawks atop hotels,
find plenty of pigeons to
use as daily prey.



Glenn Buttkus

Haibun

Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub