Karl Koweski

 

upon reading her poetry collection

her poems
read like
prayers
to an
older set
of gods

chants
from
an antler
thistled
priestess
shaking blood
from
her golden
tresses

transports me
to the
fantasy forests
of her mind
where
her words
are red eyes
peering
from
every shadow

poems like
bathwater
babies
discarded
by gin wild
gypsies

crawling
toward me
howling
and implacable

strangling me
with slick
placentas

until
there is
nothing left
of me

except
my desire
for her
____________

social media memes killed the internet poet

it’s been nearly ten years
since I’ve written a poem

around the time my children
got savvy with the
internet search engines
my fingers stopped typing

confessional poetry
is not the greatest
creative outlet
for a man with
the darkest demons
to exorcise

justifying my sins
to internet poetry sites
after a while
began to read
like fan fiction written
to myself

so I stopped

and while the world
missed nothing,
what with the
cleverly reposted memes
grabbing acknowledgements
and validations
in ego-soothing multitudes

I lost everything
I ever had to offer

____________

finally eventually

when I discovered my audience
I lost my voice
all those fragments of wisdom
gleaned from half-priced books
refracted back at me
from half-assed experiences
lost the urgency of imagination

lately I’ve heard whispers
ten years removed
from the thrill of the byline
seventy blank notebooks
countless idle black felt pens
anticipating that meager
creative spark sputtering
across collapsing synapses

the veteran stationed outside Foodland by Karl Koweski

mourns the moral dissolution
destroying this once great nation
made apparent by the
poor posture of today’s youth
and their sudden interest
in their fancy computer phones
as they approach the card table
set up near the coke machines
next to the Foodland entrance

the old man with the VFW hat
like a syphilitic Philipino vagina
perched on his liver-spotted head
wants to tell these whelps its because
of his efforts defeating the Koreans
they now enjoy the ability to
tweet the twitter #freedomaintfree

is it too much to ask these consumers
here by the grace of god, guns and
the geopolitical war machine
that they give up their pocket change
for a swatch of the stars and stripes
stapled to a toothpick in China?

the veteran stationed outside Foodland by Karl Koweski

mourns the moral dissolution
destroying this once great nation
made apparent by the
poor posture of today’s youth
and their sudden interest
in their fancy computer phones
as they approach the card table
set up near the coke machines
next to the Foodland entrance

the old man with the VFW hat
like a syphilitic Philipino vagina
perched on his liver-spotted head
wants to tell these whelps its because
of his efforts defeating the Koreans
they now enjoy the ability to
tweet the twitter #freedomaintfree

is it too much to ask these consumers
here by the grace of god, guns and
the geopolitical war machine
that they give up their pocket change
for a swatch of the stars and stripes
stapled to a toothpick in China?

Three poems by Karl Koweski

apt 402

I tend to my rectangular plot of sky
adorned with distant pine trees
and a hint of mountain
jet planes make an Etch A Sketch
of the light blue tableau
and I smoke cigarettes
as the sun shifts perspective

this could be some sort of life
a balcony seat to this
theatre of apartment existence
murder behind every door
and television windows
offer mute witness, empty eyes
leaving only the sky
immune to the drama below

there must be an escape
from this domestic retreat
how was I capable of
leaving a family I love
while resisting the need
to quit a job I’m miserable with?
the quick succession of days
leading to a rectangular plot of soil
and a black immutable sky
____________

Occupy Wal-Mart by Karl Koweski

they convey only
a vague notion of politics
their idealism accidentally
mirroring the Republican
mindset in that
they are gathered here
inside this Wal-Mart
on this Black Friday
with no greater agenda
than to spend more money
than they have budgeted

though they have the
sheer numbers needed
to bypass capitalism
in favor of anarchy
the rabble save the rioting
for the two dollar waffle irons
and fifty dollar blu-ray players
revolution to their
regional universal minds
involves nothing more chaotic
illogical
that switching their allegiances
in college football teams

the consumers occupy Wal-Mart
they way maggots occupy
a raccoon carcass
beneficial to a system
rotting from the inside out
eventually leaving
nothing

Two Poems by Karl Koweski

bones inscribed with the language of adoration

eyes all around me
like collapsed stars
black hole vortexes
allowing nothing to escape
until you arrived with
all the rapture of
a new mythology
the twin suns of your eyes
offers my only illumination
your eyes harbor
the solitary warmth
caressing my skin
your eyes inspire worship
if faith moves mountains
my love can shatter them
I would build pyramids
from the rubble
two hundred ton monoliths
stacked a mile high
so I might rise up
and scorch away my flesh
with the heat of our lust
leaving behind this
fused skeleton
bones inscribed with
the language of adoration
as a testament
to your divinity

_____________________

 

a shiny silver piece of you

I find your earring behind
the passenger seat
this shiny silver piece of you
dislodged the night before
this shiny silver piece of you
inside you as once
I was inside you

I find your face in my mind
framed with black sunshine
this shadow memory of you
nestled in my embrace
this shadow memory of you
will you remember
as long as I will?

Karl Koweski…Two Poems

the death and rebirth of a mechanical engineer

Jeff returned from
tending his garden
florid faced
his chest constricted
with pains he blamed
on acid reflux

ten minutes later
he laid between the
couch and coffee table
dead of a massive
heart attack
believing to the last
it was just something he ate

you can look through
the glass of his
office window and
see his safety glasses
folded on his desk
surrounded by a
conspiracy of
yellow post-it notes
bearing neatly printed
numbers and letters
that lost all meaning
last Saturday afternoon

the pictures of his children
like three little Jeffs
trapped in cryogenic sleep
their faces frozen in
perpetually staged smiles
lacking any conception
of a fatherless future

the tongues hang out
of his work boots
laces crossed like
autopsy stitches

no one will ever
wear those boots again
leather and flesh
rendered equally useless

he left Friday
with no doubt
he’d return Monday

two weeks from now
there will be a new body
occupying the empty chair
rebuilding a confederacy
of pink post-it notes
with a hieroglyphic trove
of important numerals
and another
cryogenically slumbering
brood no less unaware
of the surprise
party mortality
waiting to be sprung

_______________________

judas kiss

widow’s peak and fingers steepled
before the Satanic church of her lips
a congregation of mischief seated
behind the blue green altars
her neck adorned with flowers
forever fresh and scented with poeme
and I am the priest
the monsignor of this one church,
one goddess with a hundred administrations
I light her candles for evening mass
I kneel before her open gospel
reciting my favorite passage
to a litany of hallelujahs
I kiss the seven stars leading to heaven
nightly, I ordain myself in her ministry
I cloak myself in the vestments
of her omniscience
her faithful servant
until the seas run red with blood
and the dead walk the earth again

the poet by Karl Koweski

               
 
the poet
mimics the occasional
decent line
while remaining incapable
of creating
a memorable poem
 
in lieu of
voicing his own thoughts
in his own words
the poet resurrects the dead
to speak for him
with oft-quoted passages
of Bukowski cliches
and Ginsberg observations
 
the poet
pontificates on the sad state
of the small press
while envisioning
a conglomeration of houses
aligned by their dedication
in propagating
his predictably bleak verse
 
until then
it’s facebook posts
and myspace blogs
likes and kudos from the poets
possessed of lesser talents,
the devoted rocks upon which
he dreams of building his church
his verse constituting
a bible of second hand despair
 
but the grave
embraces the meek
before god ever would
and the little poets gripping
their little saddle-stapled gospels
will realize soon enough
god doesn’t favor the faithful
when the poet fails
to return their adulation,
these unanswered prayers,
the acolytes will take
their bylines elsewhere
leaving the poet with
the blank page
he failed to convert
in the beginning

the poet by Karl Koweski

               
 
the poet
mimics the occasional
decent line
while remaining incapable
of creating
a memorable poem
 
in lieu of
voicing his own thoughts
in his own words
the poet resurrects the dead
to speak for him
with oft-quoted passages
of Bukowski cliches
and Ginsberg observations
 
the poet
pontificates on the sad state
of the small press
while envisioning
a conglomeration of houses
aligned by their dedication
in propagating
his predictably bleak verse
 
until then
it’s facebook posts
and myspace blogs
likes and kudos from the poets
possessed of lesser talents,
the devoted rocks upon which
he dreams of building his church
his verse constituting
a bible of second hand despair
 
but the grave
embraces the meek
before god ever would
and the little poets gripping
their little saddle-stapled gospels
will realize soon enough
god doesn’t favor the faithful
when the poet fails
to return their adulation,
these unanswered prayers,
the acolytes will take
their bylines elsewhere
leaving the poet with
the blank page
he failed to convert
in the beginning

Hunting Kuntz by Karl Koweski

                       
 
     Beneath the glass counter at Bleacher Bums card shop lies a modern day reliquary for the memento mori of the only saints who matter any more.  Rather than the knucklebone of Saint Andrew or Saint Felix the Eviscerated’s toenail, Bleacher Bums deals in the relics of sport’s saints, those enshrined in the Hall of Fame and those yet to be canonized.  There are bits of game worn jerseys and scraps of game-used bats pressed into cardboard.
 
     I hover over the artifacts from the patron saints of the north side.  A swath of Andre Dawson’s all star jersey and a section of elastic band from Ryne Sandberg’s jockstrap offered by Topps Triple Thread.  Only one of three in existence and a steal at the low price of two hundred and fifty dollars.
 
     “Can I help you, fella?”
 
     The guy running things looks old enough to have witnessed the last Cubbies World Series appearance.  His shirt pisses me off immediately, two disparate tees sewn together down the center like a Windy City Frankenstein. The blue side bears the Cubbies insignia, the black side… The bullshit White Sox.
 
     “You suppose to be some kinda Chi-Town Switzerland?”
 
     Swiss Miss cocks a bristled eyebrow and crosses his arms above his Old Style keg of a belly.  “You come in here to bust my balls?  Or is there something else you might be needing?  Cause Zambrano’s on the mound, buddy, and he’s carrying a no-hitter into the bottom of the second.”
 
     “I’m hunting Kuntz.  Rusty Kuntz.  The greatest .230 career hitter ever to swat a lazy fly ball to center field with the bases loaded.”
    
     “Hmph.”  He braces his hands on the counter, flexing the beer flab in a vaguely muscular way.  “Kuntz, you say?”
 
     “Rusty Kuntz.  I have the largest collection of Kuntz memorabilia in the country.”
    
     Granted, that only encompasses about five years of baseball cards from the late seventies to early eighties.  There are no game-used paraphernalia cards bearing Kuntz swag.  I procured a Twins jersey worn by Kuntz for ten dollars and a half case of Schlitz.
 
     “I seem to remember a Koontz coming up with the White Sox organization.  Retired from the Tigers after the ‘84 World Series.”
 
     “That’s him.  Except it’s Kuntz.  Like a vagina.”
 
     “It’s Koontz.  Like the writer of Phantoms.”
 
     “Kuntz, I say.  There ain’t no Os in his name.”
 
     “So, you’re a Koontz expect?”
    
     “I know a thing or two about Kuntz.”
    
     “What?  You a relative?”
 
     “More like a brother-in-arms.  They call me Philip Kuntz.”
    
     “Yeah, buddy, I can tell by the way you’re standing, you couldn’t fill up a shot glass.”
 
     We stand there on opposite sides of the counter, arms crossed over our chests.  He stares at my forehead.  I stare at a plaque of Nolan Ryan, blood dripping from his nose onto his jersey, as though the picture were saying “see, baseball’s not a sport for pussies.”
    
     “You can’t tell that by the way I’m standing.”
 
     “I can tell that by you being a thirty-something year-old man asking for the baseball cards of a man with a funny name.”
 
     “All right, I’ll concede your point, old man.  So you gonna get me all your Rusty Kuntz or not?”
 
     “No.  I don’t have any Rusty Koontz for you.  You bought all the Rusty Koontz cards I had in the inventory when you came sniffing around here for Rusty Koontz last year.”
 
     “Really?”
 
     “You not remember having this same exact conversation with me last time?”
 
     “I actually have this conversation all the time.”
 
     “Yeah, I suspected as much.  You see that bat hanging up there?  The one autographed by Keith Moreland, Jody Davis and Leon Durham?”
 
     “Yeah.  Three hundred bucks is a little steep to be asking for it, ain’t it?”
 
     “Next time you walk in here asking for Rusty Koontz–”
 
     “Kuntz.”
 
     “Next time I catch you in here, I’m gonna take that bat off the wall and hit you in the face with it.  Understand?”
 
     “Sorta.”
 
     “Good.  Now fuck off.”
 
     I walk out into the hazy sunlight and breathe in the refinery tinged air.  There’s time to kill and not a lot of murder implements at my disposal. 
 
     Somewhere, Rusty Kuntz possesses a World Series ring and Ryne Sandberg does not.  That’s the kind of world we live in.