Chris Butler is an illiterate poet and an anorexic starving artist. His 10 book “Poems of Pain” series, including Artsy Fartsy (Alternating Current Press), BUMMER (Scars Publications), Neurotica (Down in the Dirt) and DOOMER (Ethel Press) was completed in 2023 with the publication of the final collection in the series, Beatitudes (Dakota Publishing Company). He also co-wrote a book of poems, Dead Beats, with Dr. Randall K. Rogers. He has been the co-editor of The Beatnik Cowboy literary journal since 2015.
Empires Fall
One morning you leave the house feeling good.
Great, in fact. The wind just right, a constant
certain breath in the air, refreshing in a soft,
invisible way, a reassurance that every step
you take is a correct step forward. Or, if not
forward, then correct in its improvised
arrangement, its volition to arrive somewhere
else. Somewhere new. So you keep leaving
without having meant to. And you think,
Nowhere to go but there. Where I’m going.
You notice the sunlight filtering evenly
through the leaves and decide, Perfect,
just as it should be. Blue patch of sky
showing between rooftops and trees,
carrying the faint ghost of last night’s
moon like an afterthought. Yes, all is
well, the voice inside continues. Exactly
the way you believed it could one day be.
Without turning to look, you see the house
now behind you, the shut windows, the closed
door, everyone still asleep, the white porch
paint beginning to peel, flag on a stick
barely stirring. You watch it all recede,
growing smaller with each quickened step.
Your eyes fixed on what’s in front of you
growing larger as you near. Eighteen years.
A lifetime ago. But you feel no sorrow, only
joy. Or, if not joy, determination. You’ll visit
again, now and then. Each visit more distant
than the last. But for the most part you
know this is it. This is change. Farewell.
Hello. Time to move on. While there’s time.
And that voice inside reassures, This is good.
This is right. This is always how it had to be.
Goa, India
To the woman crossing the intersection
of Bogmalo and Zuari Roads
at 2:21 in the afternoon,
February 28,
2019,
a Thursday,
with a big blue
office cooler-size bottle
of sun-bright plastic
water perfectly
balanced,
hands-free, atop your
purple covered head,
and which stayed there,
balanced,
glowing aquamarine,
even as your head turned
abruptly to catch me
attempting to take your image
with what I thought to be
a surreptitious camera eye,
and the look on your face:
can I ever forget
the sad quiet anger
that said, unmistakably,
“Don’t!”?
And I didn’t.
Lowering the lens,
then my gaze,
shamefully toward my knees.
Though you, no doubt,
believed otherwise as the light
turned green
and the taxi where I sat
safely ensconced
sped off
in a different direction.
Greater that a rich man
will crawl through the eye
of a needle
than you will ever read this.
And yet, as Lord
Shiva is my witness,
I want you to know,
unequivocally
and with absolute contrition,
I didn’t!
To a Small House
The tests are back.
You’d die laughing
through leaves
if you knew.
(Myself silly too.)
Which is how,
no doubt, it all
began. And I
wonder now
if, perhaps, we
could have found
it in History
with a capital
“H” and stopped
it in its tracks?
Or at least on
an old calendar
with a small
“c” and mostly
X’ed-out dates,
though a few
circled (some
even starred)
in red, as well.
Remember?
In any case,
one of us
judged (or was
it misjudged?)
the way light
appeared, entered
obliquely, gave
a party
(think: shine
on shine)
and we were (or
so we believed)
radiant lines
of pure poetry.
Something like
an eternal silver
wedding cake,
one tier
for each year
of transparency,
i.e., blissful
indifference. But
now the roses
on the bedroom
wall are peeling,
the sofa just
sits and sags,
and hands and
feet look, if
not ugly, then
certainly funny.
In the end
(according to
the tests (oh,
you’d laugh!))
it will all swell
unhappily off
course and,
of course,
much too late.
Chasing Potholes
Two roads diverged in a sallow wood.
With a load of blacktop, I traveled both.
For one was just as hole-y as the other.
Lucky me. Each led to Starbucks and a KFC.
Oh, morning pee, where is thy stream?
In a week, I’ll be 53. Age is but a number
of debilitating ailments increasing rapidly.
Maybe I should have been a plumber?
What if I have a question but can’t raise
my hand? Will the little girls understand?
I flush with a blush. Verily, verily swirls
the dream. Nothing to do and no one to
do it with. The spoon is missing the dish.
Pave it all to Hell and back. Paradise is locked.
I watch my night-sky screen saver pocked
with stars. I pick one and make a wish.
How to Disappear Completely and Never Be Found
Whittle with the wind. Blubber and bleed
at each end. Drag your self with both fists
down an alley of cut sharp rib. Let your rap
hole reek of hemlock. Turn one white sock
into an ill-fitting glove. For one buck, or less,
do a killer moonwalk. Scream: “Not hungry!
ANGRY!” See that highway stretching sea
to oily sea? It goes nowhere you need to be.
Pass people on the street curled up fetal,
or laid out straight as a needle, and never
know if they’re breathing or not. Play “Fifty
Ways to Leave Your Liver.” Fifty little puffs of
cloud descend upon the Giver. It’s just a world,
rigged and wired, rather silly. A crumpled atlas,
really. One shrug, one cartoon K-9 ditching its fleas
and—poof!: no more ground beneath your knees.
The Kernel*
I was all kneecaps and embedded lace.
You were liquor on a paper terrace,
eyes rimmed with salt air. The Paris
moon was a pistol in a mad cop’s face.
Between poems, I swung legs true
and bare above my head until
my hands split like sacks to spill
human sugar and Voltaire. You threw
a bottle of broken English at the plate
glass window’s ear, ordered the maid
to slice more mango. I tongue tied
a T.V. cord round the neck of 2008,
hung it like a good year. The green
parrot squawked Merde! on the one clean
scrap of floor. You cut the table in two.
The House was divided with peach halves,
lamb’s blood. The daily bread was blue.
Between poems, commercials offered salves
on a gold and cushioned tray. Our raison
d’etre was easy. Governing was our forte.
(*This piece borrows and repurposes a number of words from Carolyn Forche’s poem “The Colonel”.) American Sonnet
Sitting here helping my fingernails grow.
Skating around my own mental rink.
Hello’s but a stone’s throw
from the immanent brink.
The tape’s running slow.
My lips aren’t in sync.
All night I crow.
All day I blink.
Can’t know!
Don’t think!
Watch Aristotle
spin down the sink.
I pass Love the bottle
and Love takes a drink.
John Martino is a writer, educator, and avid traveler currently residing in Hong Kong. Some of his wayward poems have found a home at North Dakota Quarterly, Another Chicago Magazine, Packingtown Review, and BOMBFIRE, among others. He is the Executive Editor at Home Planet News (homeplanetnews.com).
New Fridge
Dear New 'Fridge,
You are beautiful
You shine like a diamond
You make ice instantly
You are a genius
You are enormous, efficient
But you devour things completely
You make me bend down to you
Almost in reverence it may seem
You are a hard taskmaster
You cavernous monstrous machine
You are giving me back breaking tasks
I am at times confused and at times concerned
Where's the butter, where's the cheese?
Did we finish the curry yesterday or is it lurking in some deep corner
Of your unfathomable depths
I scramble to seize
You have brought me to my knees
Now don't bring me to my dotage
You shiny silent efficient machine!
Sushama Kasbekar
CREATING AN ESTATE OF HAPPINESS FOR YOURSELF
-Dr. Jernail S. Anand
Those who love silver and crave for gold
Will say one day, we have committed suicide.
- Kaifi Azmi
The men of business in olden times would write on their 'Gullaks' (chests) would write ‘Shubh Labh’ (Just Profit). Those times when people were not so ambitious for personal growth, were better times, because the general tone of society was that of goodness, kindness, and an all pervading sense of mutual understanding and love for humanity.
PROFIT JUST OR UNJUST
Profit is fine, but how can it be ‘Shubh’ [Just]? Who knows the difference between Shubh and Ashubh [Just and Unjust]? If the business is carried out with just practices, it gives joy. But when we resort to unjust practices to maximize profits, it spreads pain. As most of the people are after unjust profits, as widespread is the incidence of pain. Pain is symptomatic of some abnormality in the body. And when it remains untreated over years, it gives rise to chronic ailments. We are all afflicted with a malaise: psycho-spiritual sickness. We are running after wealth and in the pursuit, lose the joy of living. At the same time, we push thousands below the poverty line with our indiscrete actions aimed at self-promotion.
FAIR IS FOUL: THE ZONE OF THE UNDESIRABLE
Fair is foul, foul is fair,
hover through fog and filthy air".
Macbeth's witches make a great statement. The civilization represents the ‘fair’ which the witches declare as ‘foul’. For ordinary intelligence, it is difficult to distinguish between Right and Not Right. People doing ordinary jobs and living somehow, don’t even realize when they have stepped into the Zone of the Undesirable. But the essential question is: Even if they know, will they stop? The entire populace is busy in making fast buck. Some lose their scruples when life is too hard on them. And some, on whom luck has smiled, think why we should look back?
LOVE AND WAR
Love is a sacred emotion, yet people believe that everything is fair in love and war. ‘Tam sam dand bhed’ are the words oft repeated by men who have no scruples. Men, in general, are bound by a sense of the moral and the immoral, but we take the first opportunity to override these considerations. It has to be noted that men in general hold on to principles. But there is only one variety of people who lack all scruples. It is the politicians. For whom, every day is an undeclared war, which must be won. So, principles are a suicidal passion for a politician. Those who use uneven methods to win their love, too are never forgiven by gods who are closely monitoring our conduct. Have we seen any politician dying an enviable death, except in case of a few, who acted as statesmen, and upheld their principles? In love too, if we miss the moral mark, all unions fizzle out leaving behind a family on the rocks.
THE RIGHT CONDUCT
Friends who are well endowed often ask: what is bad in making money? One of them deals in shares. If they rise, what is wrong in it? Some have invested their money in real estate from where they get interest on their wealth. The question is: what is unethical about it. Further on, if you start an industry, and if gods are kind and it starts prospering, what is wrong in it? Is ambition an unethical passion? Can we stop people from growing up?
These are scorching questions. We cannot stop people from starting their business, and everyone wants that the business should prosper. In the same way, the man of the stock market too cannot be faulted if he gets a fortune by a rise in the value of his shares.
The basic issue here is: Do you want happiness? Or you simply want Wealth?
If your preference is for Wealth, then all your pursuits are justified. But don’t blame gods if your son develops some problem, or your daughter elopes with someone. Your wife can have asthma. And you too can have blood pressure. You may have to visit a heart surgeon, to get a stent. Wealth brings in its train all these unceremonious things. If you have too much of it, one of your sons may decide to get rid of you and grab the entire wealth you have created. Anything can be expected from jealous gods. You are entirely innocent. There is nothing wrong in making fast buck. Millions have been making millions. And you can hear the high voices of celebrations from across the continents. Men of success, enjoying the fruits of their labour.
However, if Happiness is your passion, then, it all depends on how you use your wealth. If you are a man of business, let me take you back to the beginning of this article. Remember ‘Shubh Labh’. Every penny that you earn should be through ‘just’ means. If gods are kind and bless you with wealth, you can share it with those who need it. It will make the cosmic forces happy. And this happiness will reflect in your eyes, on your forehead, and in your body language. Look at the body language of those who died for the country. S. Bhagat Singh, Lala Hardyal. And look at the body language of our great money makers who have their wealth in Swiss banks. It is all a matter of choice. Happiness or Wealth- both cannot be put together, unless you have a mind trained in cosmic sympathy, and you possess the power to part with your wealth so that you can create an estate of happiness for yourself.
The final word is: Think of your happiness, and create as much wealth as much as you can, but make sure, it does not make anyone poor. If it can uplift others also, it is an act of goodness, and loved by gods.
Dr Jernail Singh Anand, President of the International Academy of Ethics, is author of 161 books in English poetry, fiction, non-fiction, philosophy and spirituality. He was awarded Charter of Morava, the great Award by Serbian Writers Association, Belgrade and his name was engraved on the Poets’ Rock in Serbia. The Academy of Arts and philosophical Sciences of Bari [Italy] honoured him with the award of an Honourable Academic. Recently, he was awarded Doctor of Philosophy [Honoris Causa] by the University of Engg and Management, Jaipur. Recently, he organized an International Conference on Contemporary Ethics at Chandigarh. His most phenomenal book is Lustus:The Prince of Darkness [first epic of the Mahkaal Trilogy]. [Email: anandjs55@yahoo.com Mobile: 919876652401[Whatsapp]
Link Bibliography:
https://atunispoetry.com/2023/12/08/indian-author-dr-jernail-s-anand-honoured-at-the-60th-belgrade-international-meeting-of-writers/
Maid Corbic from Tuzla, 24 years old. In his spare time he writes poetry that repeatedly praised as well as rewarded. He also selflessly helps others around him, and he is moderator of the World Literature Forum WLFPH (World Literature Forum Peace and Humanity) for humanity and peace in the world. He is world 44. poet in the world and five in the Balkan. He has over the 10.000 successes on Facebook.
I am Helena LeClerc Reformed Solemniac
Hah so there you are. Hah so there you are whichwise won’t now nor never believe in this comfybed—this comfybed you believe on in one of two ways depending on depending of, as; 1, that it is no rest at all ‘cause no sleep’s allowed, or 2. It is rest time please leave me alone I am sleeping don’t tug me up out over to you whomever you are, which doesn’t matter, on cause which that you need your sleep and can’t function without it so don’t ruin the morning to come by making it another stumbling sand pit of low exhaustion inability to know hear understand speak or or or whatever, so.
No mind my nameplate that back at Grundig’s read Helena LeClerc Reformed Solemniac and that now again reads what eh? Oh, pitiful one claiming it is too far out for one such asleep as you are not so okay so okay here it is flat in your face my name’s Helena LeClerc Reformed Solemniac see this Helena yas first name then LeClerc yas nextname then Reformed yup yup yup that’s me too all over and the last be; Solemniac; off punch you’ gut wit’ Helena—then wit’ LeClerc Reformed—then last wit’ Solemniac—hey! Helena LeClerc Reformed Solemniac—ho! There! You woke now? Wakened out up and in now eh?
So! Sonboy!
Listen to me I am Helena LeClerc Reformed Solemniac Helena LeClerc Reformed Solemniac, and again and forever Helena LeClerc Reformed Solemniac so!
Be awake!
Now and immediately!
Ah oh stand back blanket flung four by four splintering sheet rent gold flecks shattered torn shreds flying shot from the ground and unseen in the dark, signboard first in two and, unseen in the dark, then in five, is eh then in fifty eh one hundred eh all rubble eh grown down into grassweeds time and pressure pressure and time too hot much too hot much hot too much too hot no up get go up get go danger hey—
Sonboy up awake and unseen in the dark shouting.
The light! Give me light!
What is the where is this?
Give me light!
Snap-on; all a’beaming—
Sonboy, good morning.
Ah—who are you—I—
I am, for the last time, Helena LeClerc Reformed Solemniac.
Oh—
But, as previously stated, you may call me Dwight.
Sonboy’s fists came up twisting the sleep from his eyes. The black pebble swirl from within soothed and soothed and he kept at it until the pressure turned unpleasant lowering his fists, and, blinking, he beheld things at last clearly.
Sonboy! Sonboy.
At last and for once clearly.
Mom, he stated.
The word licked in his mouth as she said, Come on Sonboy. I’ll whip you up some breakfast. Come on.
Jim Meirose's short work is widely published, and his novels include "Sunday Dinner with Father Dwyer"(Optional Books), "Le Overgivers au Club de la Résurrection" (Mannequin Haus), "No and Maybe - Maybe and No"(Pski's Porch), "Audio Bookies" (LJMcD Communications), "Et Tu" (C22 press), and "Game 5" (Soros Books). info: www.jimmeirose.com, X id @jwmeirose
