Sons of Cain

painting by vincent valdez

Sons of Cain

"It is the first responsibility of every citizen to question authority."
--Benjamin Franklin




The Man, the Man, always the goddamn Man, everywhere--

the deadly deaf mute of discipline,

the bastard boss, haughty honcho, belligerent badass.

First the blinding glare off the silver badges,

then the oaken baton in your gut,

the pump shotgun pointed at your head;

his tiny red pig-weasel eyes squinting,

rat saliva at the corners of his maggot maw,

barking rules, spouting hate, cuddling cruelty.

You must always beware of the Man,

do as he demands,

stay in your cubicle,

never leave your neighborhood,

step out on green,

halt absolutely on red,

put your credit card into the breath-o-meter,

do not lose your spoon,

do not forget your fucking number,

you must never speak your mind,

never congregate in groups,

never hold up hand-made placards.

Bend low and respect the Man, fear

his might, power, shiny boots, great rowelled spurs,

and his darkly tinted robo-visor.

All you brethren must blend seamlessly

or the Man will focus his considerable wrath

on you, your family, your children, your friends,

and from the intestines of hell,

from dungeons unseen,

from row upon row of shallow graves,

will come the cries of those already destroyed,

all mingled into a single throbbing wailing

that will shatter windows and break spirits,

from those who stood up to the full blast,

whose words are slain by riot winds,

who were crushed down without epitaphs,

and no doubt you will weep for them,

reach out to them, but take care

not to have to join them.

Glenn Buttkus

June 2012

Posted over on dVerse Poets-FFA

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Soldier's Song

painting by joel spector

Soldier’s Song

Our history books 

are spattered with blood ponds

collected from myriads of men in mail,

who 

     swung

              the

                Lord’s

                        sword,

fighting in jihad, holy war, 

or politically designated skirmishes,

crushing the Infidels,

sowing death like berserk angels

with God on one side,

then the other.

White silken banners

and tunics stretched over armor

blazoned with bright red crosses,

or Saracen swords,

centuries soul-crusted upon centuries,

always with men on lonely battlements

or hunkered down in fire-bases

talking to Jesus Mohammed: 

Make it worthwhile, sweet Lord,

for my brothers are all dead,

their bodies ripped asunder,

just slaughtered sheep

lying all about me,

their beautiful voices are silent

and the stench of butchered meat

rises thick off festering corpses

choking the liberty out of me,

piled holocaust-high as sacrifice

to the cruel kings of this earth;

Yes, I understand that my enemy

is godless and love can not be wasted

on heathens- but I have killed for You

and even though the wet blood

under my fingernails will wash off, 

the black death mold that surges

into my heart seems inexorable;

I tell you I hear them, those angry voices

coming for me out there in the void,

calling my name in ten languages,

and I just have to tell you

I do not feel ready to give

the last measure of my devotion,

for doubt plagues me

like a red demon riding my shoulders;

for all the mothers of heathens

cannot be whores--I see men’s faces

looking up at me off the concertina wire,

men who had rallied 

to banners of their own

praying to their perception of You,

men with children,

who had known fear, 

and lice and love,

whose families and flower gardens

still await their return,

so tell me big man,

whose bullet is more holy, and

will I see the face of my God

just as my heart stops?

Glenn Buttkus

June 2012

Posted over on dVerse Poets-OLN

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Xbox Xmas

image borrowed from bing

Xbox Xmas

Christmas Eve, 2007, and my youngest daughters arrived

ready to cook for the old man, then play some canasta

and phone their mother who happened to be visiting

our oldest daughter nesting in Baltimore, and the two

grandsons; one brand new, one not.

My girls

           stayed until

                            i was exhausted

                                         hoping to help

                                                 me    

                                                 forget 

           that after all I was home alone.

Christmas dawned cold, wet, and gray,

another yule tide in the northwest,

but I was joining dear friends

for their family breakfast;

mounds of butter-fried French toast

flipped about in huge black pans,

with a marzipan eye on each piece,

smothered in apricot syrup,

accompanied with spicy sausage, 

thick bacon and fresh fat eggs.

I was the stepchild at the table,

yet still we laughed, burped

and farted warmly, surrounded

by fir sprigs, red ribbons, bright bulbs,

and Santa’s elven figurines, 

serenaded by the dead carolers, 

Bing, Perry, Dean and Doris;

when something moving outside,

something fluffy and falling

caught our eye, yes, yes,

it was snowing,

fat pointy flakes of purest white,

first a few squads

                            then battalions

                            then whole armies

jackslamming the sky--snow,

holy Christ, snow, the whole of Puget Sound

turning white on Christmas day;

but then as I drove off the blizzard

was reduced to a flurry, becoming

snain or raow, just overweight overwrought

drops slapping my windshield and the pavement,

smack

         smack

                  smack

                           like slapping the bad dog

with the rolled up newspaper,

arriving home to just drizzle,

the alley’s potholes puddled up to greet me.

Much later awakening from a nap in my recliner,

the television screen splashed with holiday anime,

I realized that I was hungry

and my foraging of the cupboards, fridge and freezer

did not reveal that festive sustenance I craved;

finding myself in my vehicle 

roaming the wetness,

driving in senseless circles, biting my lip, 

staring into an infinity of decorated windows,

faced with empty streets, escalating darkness,

and posted on the premises I drove by, 

the message was clarion, impersonal, cruel;

“Closed for Christmas”.

But then, thank you Jesus, my solo crusade

garnered gold as I saw the sign, Denny’s,

and it was open, brightly lit, welcoming;

swinging into the place 

I parked in the last open spot,

and pushing open the door

I was greeted by a whoosh 

of warm air laden with happy voices

and a young greeter who said,

“Merry Christmas, welcome to Denny’s.”

She seated me in my booth

and presented me with the one page menu,

a spartan ten choices of “holiday specials”.

I ordered the meat loaf, home fries, and apple sauce

with a strong cup of cafe coffee,

drumming my fingers on the plastic table top,

interrupted, nearly overwhelmed by

sadness, 

like a silent sob, 

a throbbing stabbing ache

rising up from my innards,

uninvited.

The imp behind my left ear asked,

“What kind of losers come to Denny’s

for their Christmas dinner?”;

looking around I saw all kinds,

entire families, truck drivers, junkies,

street people, whores, and three old ladies,

and for a moment they were

all staring at  me

staring at them.

Dipshit, 

I heard myself mutter

as the feast arrived

and I rolled up my sleeves

and consumed the meal

as if it were the finest prime rib

served on silver platters

by ten naked dancing girls.

Driving home, listening to a religious choir

I began to recall the events I read about

in the morning’s newspaper,

reflecting on the holiday choices

we had all made that day:

23 dead from a car bomb in Baghdad,

15 dead from a suicide bomber in Bombay,

and all the deployed armed forces of the

American Empire of the United States

were fed a special meal,

30,000 frozen turkeys 

and a ton of cranberry sauce,

and this god damned All American

City of Tacoma had counted up

800 homeless souls who had crowded

into the city’s flophouses and missions

on Christmas Eve.

Glenn Buttkus

June 2012

posted over on dVerse Poets-Poetics

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Wulfstan

image borrowed from deviant art

Wulfstan

We were hours deep into 

southern Louisiana one spring,

marveling at the darkness at noon,

as the sun fled, hearing a tornado warning

barking from the car radio

and for a brief blink everything

                                            was 

                                     deathly 

                                  still 

                               just 

                        before 

                          it 

                  rained 

                   so 

              hard

           we had to pull over

to the side of the highway

followed

by the bellicose bellowing 

of thunder

as we witnessed

the terrible beauty

of God’s veins

turning electric

when crackling shards

of spider web lightning

stabbed jagged holes in the sky,

 and the air was full of wolf god howling,

and we both knew that 

there was a towering wind demon

near by, swirling up farm trucks,

bath tubs, and lives;

a mega-monster

with scythes and talons

and flashing white eyes

dealing in a dozen kinds of death

and daring us to tread

within its alley.

Glenn Buttkus

June 2012

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The Line

image borrowed from bing

The Line

Sean would follow the familial edict

for the Murphys have always been cops.

He was born hungry for the badge,

would stand for hours in the iconic

“Hallway of the Constabulary”

staring lovingly at the police portraits

that lined the wall, stretching from

1899 to 1999.

He was naturally tenacious, 

and he remembered fondly 

the knuckle-kohl he created over the eye

of the stupid kid who had been 

erroneously eponymous when calling

his forbearers a “herd of pigs”.

He would be 19 tomorrow

and could barely wait to scrawl

his proud signature on the official

police academy application--

his chance, his turn to carry on

the Murphy legacy,

to become an urban warrior,

to protect and serve,

to hit the mean streets ready

to flick the silver snap 

over his service revolver, 

to finally gel with the Murphy 

version of “the long blue line” syndrome,

thankful that he also would be able

to capture his other dewy dream,

to move toward matrimony,

to make Katie his wife,

to finally lift that white tulle veil

in front of both their families,

to add her feminine strengths

to his perfect plans--

to create several sons,

to bequeath the pure police heritage,

to conjure up pride four generations deep;

but you know, if all he could produce

were daughters--that would be acceptable

too in this modern world

where women make hard ass cops,

and hell yes, his girls would be

the first femmes to join the line. 

Glenn Buttkus

May 2012. 

Posted over on Monday Melting 20

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Sanctuary

image borrowed from bing

Sanctuary 

In my waking dreams

the sky is kelly green

like the creatures from dank depths

of greenish-grey seas who tired

of swimming in the dark trenches

and squirmed up on the land,

stood erect and claimed the planet

for themselves;

since

     the

       dawn

           primeval

                     when

                          the

                            great

                                 trees

                                     blacked

                                              out

                                                   the

                                                      sun

there have been some who understood

that nature’s essence is not red,

it is green

vegetables, weeds, clover, emeralds, frogs, jungles, moss

and fungus

between the toes of tigers,

in the whirls of the burls of beech, birch

and butternut giants;

green-green, all green, and

even after the coitus of death, 

that last great mortal orgasmic gasp,

leaves tarter on dead teeth,

mold on sun-bleached bones,

dances to the rhythms of rot

as flesh and wood decompose

making their malachite way back

to the bosky womb they blossomed from,

do yourself and the planet a favor--

rinse the blood off your hands and feet,

halt your virulent voracious journey

long enough to lie down in

a soft field of clover, loose

the green fire circulating in your chest,

open your loving arms to a green sun

and do not move to join the red legions

that will tramp by, 

their silver armor clanking,

their deadly pilum held high

because

even the dust mites could tell you--

hell and war

are not

green.

Glenn Buttkus

May 2012

Posted over on Magpie Tales 120

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Old Warriors

image borrowed from yahoo

Old Warriors

darkness at noon,

there was a fire

in 

 the 

    mountains,

               and

                  now

                     the

                       desert

                           is

               covered

                   with

                    a

             black 

         fog,

a roaring crackling snarling thing

that devours everything in its path,

lambasting the lushness

of gray-green-brown,

burning,

the sky alive with cinders and sparks,

burning,

arousing arroyos,

burning,

choking canyons,

burning,

toppling great trees,

burning

as if the earth was angry

and it had spewed out magma

like molten spittle

through granite teeth,

a sea of sagebrush afire,

the oil within bursting into flames,

animals fleeing,

whole towns gutted,

rag dolls, lincoln logs, mansions,

barns, silos, horses, cattle, sheep,

all burned

converted cruelly

to blister and char;

people standing in sad huddles

on high ground, weeping and praying

horns honking,

children hysterical;

firefighters with watery weary eyes

in hard soot-smeared faces,

carrying big shovels

with arms that ached

from twenty-two hours of labor,

with blackened gashes

in their broken helmets,

asleep on their feet,

moving thickly through a macabre nightmare

of death songs,

a whole countryside burning

with fifty kinds of blood

on the sun as creatures

struggling in the hellish haze

raised their swollen eyes

to the dark clouds above,

fire clouds, that suddenly

expelled torrents of reddish-orange rain--

as the aged metallic angels swarmed

out of the east with the gracious

gift of fire retardants,

and the cheers began

for the red-nosed fire warriors,

the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress,

the Gruman PBY Supercat,

the Lockheed C-130 Hercules

and the big kahuna--

the Evergreen 747 Supertanker,

as the arrogance of the fire

was reduced to the shame

of steam, and people shouted

until they were hoarse,

thank you, thank you,

goddamn it,

thank you.

Glenn Buttkus   

May 2012

Posted over on dVerse Poets--Poetics

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