Karl Koweski, originally from Chicago, now lives on top of a mountain in Alabama for reasons that involve a woman. Once the lead singer/banjo player of the disco/punk/country band The Screaming Shits, he now spends his time writing articles for porn magazines.

KARL'S CHAPBOOKS:

PLAYTHINGS
Future Tense Books

INTERNET KILLED THE MIMEO STARR
Hemispherical Press

COMING SOON

CASUALTY OF THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION
Nerve Cowboy

COMING SOON
(2nd place in Chapbook Competition)

WRITERS WHO HAVE INFLUENCES KARL'S WRITING:

MUSIC THAT INVARIABLY GETS PLAYED WHILE KARL IS WRITING :

KARL'S RECOMMENDED WEBSITES:

---

MORE FROM KARL:

---

3 Poems by Karl Koweski

Selected Poems by Karl On Unlikely Stories website

'The Cyber Lover' by Karl on the Impetus website

'Little Deceptions' by Karl on the Impetus website

Karl's story, 'Hillbilly Bowling' on the Cheery Bleeds website

A selection of Karl's Poetry on the Suspect Thoughts website

Karl's story, 'Social Reservations' on the Megaera website

Karl's poem, 'The Killers Among Us' on the Decompositions website

SELECTED
POETRY
by Karl Koweski

MY INHERENT GOODNESS

walking out of Books-A-Million
pleased with my purchase
Ira Levin's "A Kiss Before Dying"
trade paperback for the
bargain blowout price of $3

it's gonna be a good day
crisp January afternoon
sun shining just for me
I'm away from the wife and kids
money in my pocket
a whole day to do with
as I wish

"hey, man, you got some
change you can spare me?"

I never noticed him approach
elderly white man, not too bad off
jeans somewhat grimey
but not too riddled with holes
his jacket matched the weather
his gray hair and beard no more scraggly
than your typical country fiddler
and he certainly didn't emanate
the sour stench I'd come
to associate with homelessness

"fuck off, I got nothing"

he bowed his head, continued walking
through the labyrinth
of parked cars

sure hope that wasn't god
dressed up like a beggar
trying to test me, I thought
cause if he don't know me by now...

later, watching CHILDREN OF MEN
at the cinema
the sweeping film showcasing
man's inhumanity to man
moved me to tears
reinforcing my inherent goodness

© Karl Koweski

LITMUS TEST

I was drunk
so it was difficult
for me to gauge
the woman's
physical beauty
or lack there of

the fact she was
attracted to me
put her desirability
into question

there was
my wolverine sideburns
to consider
muttonchops
descending my jawline
to the corner
of my lips
giving me the look
of a man
to be reckoned with
but it's been
well-established
in my world
women don't react well
to facial hair
that dropped
out of fashion
two centuries ago

also
she made her
boldest move
after I karaoked
"I Love The Dead"
Alice Cooper's
sinister ode
to the joys
of necrophilia
leading me to believe
she thought
if I'd fuck a corpse
I'd probably fuck her

sitting in the darkness
in a corner
of the lounge
arms around each other
as a guy on stage
flubbed his way through
"Ice Ice Baby"
she admitted
the first man tonight
who attracted her
lost out
when she discovered
his lack of teeth

she picked up a shot
of cuervo gold, said
"it only takes
four or five of these
to get me naked"
brought the tequila
to her lips
and I smacked
the shot glass
out of her hand

there was
just no telling
how many she had
before this one

I'M POSITIVE

every week
the local Optimist Club
meets at
Grumpy's restaurant

I wonder
what they talk about

do they reminisce
about
how great
things are gonna be?

I've considered
joining up
seeing what
this Optimist Club
is all about

but why bother?
I'm positive
it's all bullshit
anyway

CC'S BROOM AND SHOVEL

Iif there's one thing
I can't stand
it's a pretentious poet

but I suppose
even a guy who
cleans dogshit
out of the gutter
has a touch of ego

I suppose there
are dogshit scoopers
who consider themselves
the best
dogshit scoopers
in the entire world

so I try to
be patient
with the poets
who claim to
have a lock
on the muse

I try not to
take seriously
anything written
by a man
with the words
"last poet" in
his email address

but when the
self-titled
"last poet"
accuses me of
having lost my
wonderment at the
mystery of poetry

I have to
shake my head
and think
now here's a
dogshit scooper
who missed his calling

the mystery of poetry...
the riddle of reading...
the enigma of self-publishing...

so much dogshit

ALMOST BEAUTIFUL

she says her name
is Benita

"ah, Benita
Spanish for beautiful
I can see how
you came by the name"

my voice barnacled
with charm

"actually," she says
"my mother named
me after a fish"

and though I can also
see this resemblance
I argue with her
until she relents

the difference
between
bonita and benita

one letter away
from beautiful

but this time of night
as the dance floor
herd thins out
we're all almost beautiful
in a fishy sort of way

A POEM FOR MALACHI

so much pain in the world
and your every nerve ending
were attuned to the mass suffering
especially the physical misery
and emotional agony wrought
upon the Iraqi people
by the callous American government
and its military goon squad

at protest after protest
you called for an end
to war in the Middle East

but to no avail

it got to be
there was no more joy to be had
in the creation of experimental music
or the solving of Soduku puzzles
not when so many
Iraqi men, women and children
were being ruthlessly massacred

only one obvious option presented itself
and you went at it
with the single-minded determination
that defined your character
since you first learned
war is bad

so after composing your eulogy
along with an accompanying
harpsichord solo titled "Baghdaddio In Flames"
and posting them on your protest website
you parked your Civic along an off-ramp
in downtown Chicago where
you mounted a camcorder on a tripod
doused yourself in gasoline
struck a match and ignited
what you hoped would become a beacon
to the entire world
a symbol of protest
against the tyranny of Bush's regime
and proof positive to the Muslim people
not all Americans are so terrible

but none of the commuters
noticed your mobile pyre
and despite your MENSA membership
and regardless of your ability
to calculate PI up to the
thousandth number past the decimal
you still underestimated the
searing pain of self-conflagration

the flames hurt so badly
you accidentally knocked over
the camcorder and broke it
while you were hopping and writhing
in agony of Iraqi proportions

when your charred husk
was finally discovered
it took an additional five days
for your remains to be identified
at which point no one cared
people do crazy shit every day
and you got bumped from the news
in favour of a serial dog rapist

yet word of your self-imposed martyrdom
managed to circulate
and maybe...
maybe somewhere in the triangle of death
there's an unfortunate Sunni
at the wrong end of a machete
who stops for the moment
before his head leaves his shoulders
and thinks... thank you, Malachi
thanks a bunch

'BLOG JAMMIN'

music: Day Glo Bandits
mood: Chipper

ah, back in the day
diaries were kept
under lock and key
the very unattainability
lending an air of mystery
to an otherwise mundane
documented existence

now it seems everyone
with a sensitive soul
and internet access
pastes their trials and
tribulations onto a web log
not so much to objectify
their lives as to advertise it

looking at these online
web logs I wonder why
should I care how many
times TabooKitten’s been raped
or what sort of music
NihilistBoy listens to when
he’s in an angsty mood
they only list the most
obscure music unavailable
at the Wal-Mart, anyway
as if taste in music
is the yardstick of character

and if blogs weren’t odd enough
people can offer feedback like
“sorry about your multiple
rapes, TabooKitten, did you
hear Lunchbox Armageddon’s
playing the Biltmore
Friday night, awesome!!!”

Maybe blogs offer the spot
light were all yearn for
the fifteen minutes
Warhol promised us
maybe if I document my
endless stream of work days
marital woes and marginal
literary triumphs and defeats
three people will read it
and mention Die Cheerleader Die
is coming to Metro tomorrow

and then my life
would finally have meaning

© Karl Koweski

'NEVER KNOW WHEN YOU MIGHT NEED A BOOK'

Marie pulls up to the factory
one of her rare break time visits
I’m walking out of the bay
door as they arrive and my
daughter waves a Wizard of Oz
book out the window and yells
“never know when you might
need a book”

It’s a refrain I’ve given
my wife often during our
seven years of marriage
when she asks why I’m bringing
a novel when we’re just
running to the store

Marie shudders when she
hears Gloria parrot my line

Marie has never needed a book
even when she’s on the toliet

I wonder what she
does with her mind

© Karl Koweski
Reproduced with permission

'DRIVE A MAN TO DRINK'

I believe the new girl
suffers from a mild form
of autism which compels
her to speak constantly of
her husband’s acute alcoholism

while training Stacey
to operate the Akuma Howa
I’ll say something like
“leaving your shirt untucked
is a safety hazard”

and she’ll say something like
“my husband is such a
chronic drunk I can’t even
trust him with the car”

“ignore the wedding ring
my wife allows me to sleep
with any woman I want
provided she doesn’t find out”

“work til one in the morning
then have to be up at six
to get the kids to school cause
the hubby’s too hung over”

“of course, it’s the rare
woman I’ll sleep with; I
only unleash the Kracken upon
ladies of wit and personality”

“for some reason, when he
gets liquored up, he’ll pass out
on the basement steps with his
pants around his ankles”

and finally I won’t say
anything at all and she’ll say
“when he really gets into the
whiskey, he’ll slap me around
and call me names and I’m so
scared, but what can I do?”


© Karl Koweski
Reproduced with permission

'HOW I FOUND OUT MY WIFE WAS RUNNING AROUND WITH A MUCH YOUNGER MAN'

though I ordinarily avoid
the answering machine
I’d been anticipating
a phone call from my
brother claiming he could
explain why the Cubbies
can’t win any games

I play the one message
recorded to the machine

“hi, this is your boyfriend
Trevor, I got an ant
bite and it’s bleeding
does your tooth still hurt?
call me back, I miss you”

I ponder the words spoken
an antbite?

Though passion has been absent
from our marriage for a long
time, I don’t think my wife
would two time me with a kid
firmly entrenched in kindergarten

which leaves only Gloria
my six year old daughter who
surely doesn’t have a boyfriend


© Karl Koweski
Reproduced with permission