So on my recent expedition, I finally had an open sea encounter with a Great Hammerhead shark. Technically, I had one at Protea Banks in South Africa, but it was VERY fast and mostly fleeting – all I saw was it’s caudal fin speeding it away from our group of divers. 
In Florida, to quote erstwhile shark fisherman Quint, I got the head, tail, the whole damn thing. Unfortunately, Great Hammerheads are a speedy fish and this one was on a mission (my camera battery also died, so I didn’t get a shot), so it was similarly fleeting. But I saw it – and now, when it comes to the big sharks – I’ve only got three left I need to tally in the wild: a tiger, a basking, and a megamouth.
Sadly – this was not the only thing I would see on this dive. I witnessed a man die. The news article I’ve linked to glosses over what happened, but it was a fairly grisly way to die. As a spectator to it, I’ve been trying to make sense of it – and gosh, let’s see how my brain reacts the next time I do a big step off a dive deck or try to get up on a ladder out of the ocean. This poem is an attempt to reconcile what I know and what I don’t know about death. Continue reading “Death at Sea (New Poem)”
New Poem – iSimangaliso Night (1/20/19)
iSimangaliso Night (1/20/19)
The full moon hangs spectral
in African air chilled by Antarctic exegesis
whipping waves that bring
the leatherback mother
to a lonely stretch of titanium sand
a ritual of night
to call forth a new generation
we will bear witness
Hooked Claus: A Krampusnacht Tale
Hooked Claus
For the longest time,
no one remembered how we were partners,
the Good Cop and Bad Cop of Yuletide,
a symphony of jingle bells and rattling chains
‘ere we drove out of sight.
How disturbed must they have been by the thought of me
looking over your shoulder and salivating
as you added children to the naughty list
for transgressions great and small.
You were the carrot,
oranges in the stocking,
presents under the tree,
half-eaten cookies as a reminder that you were there.
I was the stick,
birch branches in hand,
bathtub on my back,
my stew-pot bubbling in anticipation of fresh meat.
You were the red and green of holly and mistletoe,
I was the poison.
From the first,
I have been with them.
Born of the sands of Egpyt,
I was Abo Ragl Ma Slokha,
Man with the Burnt Leg,
bane of wicked tots.
Parents around the world would conjure me in story,
the Namahage,
le Croque-mitten,
Baba Yaga,
El Coco,
to keep their brats in line.
In their stories,
they always gave me horns,
yellow eyes,
a cloven hoof at the end of one leg,
a misshapen foot on the other,
my teeth sharp,
tongue so long it could reach them from under the bed
to taste their nightmares.
When I crossed the Alps, followed the Danube,
I found a new home under the Solstice moon.
As the fires of Yule cheer burned in the village squares,
I shouted my name so loud that every child would remember it,
whisper it to each other between shudders:
I
AM
THE
KRAMPUS!!!
When the willful boy or indolent girl came to a bad end
parents would remind the kinder:
Behave or the Krampus will come for you too.
When we first met, Santa Claus,
I thought you were there to kill me.
You came to my cave in regal glory.
Father Christmas! Jolly Old Saint Nick!
Your light washed away the darkness so I had no place to hide.
Trapped, I thought you were there to finally bring a gift
to those excluded as an annual tradition.
You cannot imagine my surprise when you extended your hand,
asked “won’t you ride my sleigh tonight?”.
You put me in chains as a precaution,
you still felt my wicked heart beat beneath my goatish chest,
but left me my bundle of sticks
because as you said: spare the rod, spoil the child.
Why does no one ever see the shadow behind your rosy cheeks?
Over the years, we brought so many children to goodness,
I rarely ate.
I did not mind,
I was able to drink in their fear like an elixir.
Then one foggy Christmas eve,
I noticed your sleigh was now driven by a broken buck with a freakish nose, your retinue filled out with polar bears drinking caramel-colored sugar water, the sack was filled with things never seen in your workshop before.
My eyes full of terrible wonder,
you leaned in,
smiled,
said one word: “Plastics“.
I did not like the sound of it.
As we flew over the city and marched down the streets,
your image was everywhere.
On billboards, in newspaper ads, on TV, in shopping malls.
I would have no part of this,
with sadness in your voice, you agreed: I would have no part of this.
You banished me back to the cave,
exiled into fading memory.
But I feel them pulling me back,
through of the Black Forest,
past the gingerbread house,
out of the fairy tales,
and into a cage.
They are corking my teeth,
dumping out my stew-pot,
reeling my tongue back in,
making me safe,
making me fun,
making me marketable.
It will not be long before I star in the limelight of cartoons,
baked into the shape of cookies,
imprisoned within wrapping paper.
When I am a triumph marched down 5th Avenue on Thanksgiving,
I will know they have checked me off their list,
now as gelded as Donner and Blitzen.
I see you up there on your sleigh,
and for the first time since we first met, Santa Claus,
the Krampus is afraid.
I wonder if you felt like this, when the ad-men turned their attention on you.
© 2016, Bernard Schober/The Klute
This is an older poem, back from 2016. I always like to share it at this time of the year. It is a holiday story, with a scary ghost story, and the glories of long, long ago.
It comes from an idea by Jesse Parent (whose permission I received to do this), but mostly in structure, and of course, the title (which I’ll admit is direct parody).
I hope you enjoyed it!
Happy #NationalCheeseburgerDay!
For National Cheeseburger Day, I give you my half of the 2013 poem that myself and Joy Young brought to the semi-finals, “It’s Golden (Training Day)”
It’s Golden (Training Day)
Everyone thinks that the Clown is in charge.
His grease paint and ability to pull golden arches out of the air
are just a little show for the cameras.
I am the power behind the throne.
An all-beef patty, special sauce, the Royale…
They call me the Mayor
but you can call me McCheese.
In McDonaldland nothing gets done without my say-so.
You want some sesame seeds on that bun?
Good luck without a permit.
Want to know when the McRib is gonna be back?
Well, I’ve got the stopwatch that starts on “limited time”
and ends on “when I say so, motherfucker”.
If you want to Super Size that –
Well, you just let me know – I got a guy.
But it ain’t all dance parties with Mac and Me.
I hear the people talking about how they are the 99 Percent Value Meals
’bout wow I own this town and don’t give anything back to the community
They think this top hat and sash come cheap?
Just because I know the value of a dollar
doesn’t mean I’m gotta start handing out gift certificates
like it’s the last night of Hanukah.
I’ve got mine, you can’t have it.
If you don’t like that, get back to your McJob behind the fryer,
Tell it to your McNugget Buddies that you’re gonna serve up with dipping sauce.
This is McDonald’s, baby.
Everyone here is made of food.
The Fry Guys,
Birdie,
I think even Grimace bleeds some sort of grape drink
There is no liberation.
It’s eat or be eaten,
if you think the Hamburgular is some sort of Robin Hood
stealing the burgers away to some sort of Happy Meal…
Well, I got an army of Big Macs
that put his McAss in McJail
and he’s never coming out.
Not unless starts bringing back the cheddar for Mayor McCheese
So shut the fuck up.
The only color that matters here is Shamrock Shake green
and if you want to talk about “the people”…
everyone walking in green fields singing and holding hands?
Well have a Coke and a smile,
Then get back to work
hope we don’t cut your hours for getting out of line –
because this is McDonaldland
where cash is the Burger King.
That shit’s so good,
it’s golden.
Decision ’18 – Trying to Find Arizona and Florida’s Ocean Heroes
OCTOBER 16, 2018 UPDATE: This was a great idea that didn’t pan out. Unfortunately, September and October turned out to be incredibly busy and I wasn’t able to donate the necessary time to get this going. I will post some recommendations in the coming days, but nothing so elaborate as this had been planned.
ORIGINAL POST: August 29, 2018
While I’m a multi-issue voter – I care about whether or not my duly elected representative likes puppies, babies, AND Mom’s apple pie, for instance – there’s two issues that will make or break my support for a candidate: marine conservation and climate change. In Arizona, we’re upstream from ocean, so what we do here filters down into the Blue Eternal, and in Florida – well, Florida will literally live or die on the health of the oceans and the level of the sea. For my ocean adjacent home state of Florida, and the land-locked desert I now call home, I’ve decided to try to determine, in four races, who is the ocean hero who I can support, and hope, as a salt-water enthusiast, you will similarly support.
Those races will be Arizona’s and Florida’s gubernatorial and senatorial races, and I’m going to be honest with you – I don’t know what I’ll find. I know next to nothing about Florida gubernatorial Democratic candidates Andrew Gillum and Republican Ron DeSantis, and while I like Democratic Senator Bill Nelson, and have a fair amount of animus towards current Florida governor and Republican Senate candidate Rick Scott, I’ve never gotten into the nuts and bolts if their records on ocean policy and climate change. For Arizona, same thing with current Republican governor Doug Ducey, and Democratic candidate David Garcia. For Arizona, I’m actually fairly antagonistic towards Democratic Representative Kyrsten Sinema, and I don’t care much for Republican Representative Martha McSally, both running for Arizona Senate.
What I’ll be doing is running a series of issues up the flagpole – for DeSantis, Sinema, and McSally, I’ll be using their Congressional voting records, focusing primarily on the most current Congressional session. Likewise for Bill Nelson, I will be focusing on his Senatorial voting record. For Doug Ducey and Rick Scott, I will be focusing primarily on laws they have signed and policy edicts they have issued. Gillum will likely be the biggest challenge, as Mayor of Tallahassee, he will have the most limited ocean policy record, so I may have to extrapolate based on his Mayoral record, coupling with promises made on the campaign trail.
Full disclosure – I am a Democrat, but I’m going to attempt to boil away as much of biases as humanly possible, and go with the science and consistency (meaning: if candidate X is for small government but mandates a big government policy, you’ll hear about it. Similarly, if a candidate is anti-climate change and then takes money from Big Oil, you’ll hear about that too).
There are some things that are going to be taken as non-negotiable.
1. Climate Change: The science is settled. It is real, it is man-made (anthropogenic), and it is causing problems from coral bleaching and ocean acidification, and a political columnist with no field experience or research work’s opinion does not carry the same weight as a scientist who is doing the work.
2. Biodiversity is critically important: Yes, the desert pupfish and the Lost River sucker are as important as the great white shark and right whale.
3. Plastic pollution must be addressed: This means from your drinking straw to a ghost fishing net. There is no single solution for this non-point pollution problem, and all of us are part of the problem (from the consumer to the producer). No, skipping the straw will not draw Lisa Frank rainbows in the sky over an ocean of jumping dolphins. Unless you need it due to disablity, there’s still no reason why you should be using a straw.
4. The affects of rivers and waterways upstream affect ocean health: This should be a no-brainer, but some people don’t get this.
The rating system will be clear and concise. I’ll introduce it with the first post I do, no later than Saturday morning, and we’ll start off, as is my wont, with shark conservation.
NOTE: THIS IS THE WORK OF A PRIVATE CITIZEN, EXPRESSING OPINIONS GUARANTEED UNDER THE 1ST AMENDMENT TO THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES. I REPRESENT NO POLITICAL PARTY, POLITICAL ACTION COMMITTEE, 501(c)3 or 501(c4) CHARITABLE ORGANIZATION, OR COMPANY.
The Klute Is Taking Over Phoenix Comic Fest!!!
Hey Klutefans!
The Klute is going to be appearing all four days at Phoenix Comic Fest in beautiful downtown Phoenix, AZ, from May 24th to May 27th.
Most of the time you’ll find him on the exhibition floor with Amazing Wyked Writers!
If you click on this link, you can let The Klute know when you’re coming!
Continue reading “The Klute Is Taking Over Phoenix Comic Fest!!!”
Poem: The Consequence of Technology Unchecked.
Here’s a poem from “Chumming the Waters” (available in my new shop!) that touches on the themes which seem to be dominating the week, which include anthropogenic climate change (and our government’s steadfast refusal to acknowlege it), devastating storms, and as always, sharks.
I give you The Consequence of Technology Unchecked!
Continue reading “Poem: The Consequence of Technology Unchecked.”
THIS JUST IN: Exclusive Words Available at Shark-Con!
On July 8th at Shark-Con in Tampa, FL, I will be releasing a brand new collection of poems, essays, and art called “Cap’n Klute’s Ocean Almanac, Vol. 44 #2”! It’s probably the most ambitious project I’ve ever embarked on. It’s a collection of some of the essays and poetry, and I’ve commissioned a whole bunch of illustrations and drawings from some of Arizona’s top talent to present the work in a way you’ve never seen before. I’m really excited.
And to sweeten the deal, I’m including an exclusive book-only essay on tiki bar culture and sharks! The essay also includes two drink recipes I’ve created, the Blue Guadalupe and the Waidroka Angel, and if you come to Shark-Con you can buy tiki mugs to serve those drink recipes in (note: that tiki in the picture is not what I’m selling, that’s one from my private collection).
As always, any and all profits from the books, tiki mugs, t-shirts, and stuff for the little remoras in your school get donated to shark conservation groups.
So if you love sharks, if you love the ocean, if you love tiki bar culture, and like it all with a little chaser of sarcasm, you know where you need to be on July 8th and 9th.
Come to the Florida State Fairgrounds in Tampa, FL and indulge your love of all things sharky, and stop by my booth, and say hi!
Follow Shark-Con on Facebook, or on Twitter – there might be some upcoming discounts. You never know.
Poem: The Prophecy of Teeth and Blood
“The Prophecy of Teeth and Blood”, my first shark poem, written in 2010 after the Deepwater Horizon disaster. It was performed to great effect* by Team Mesa 2010 at the National Poetry Slam by myself, Brit Shostak (now of Portland, OR), Tristan Marshell, and Lauren Perry.
On this, the seventh anniversary of the disaster, I revisit Gulf of Mexico on that terrible day, through the unblinking, slitted eyes of a bull shark.
Continue reading “Poem: The Prophecy of Teeth and Blood”
Poem – Whale War III
So I wrote this one awhile back… A variation on the Apocalypse I wrote for an unreleased chapbook I had planned back in 2012 called The 14th Bak’tun, when the height of paranoia surrounding the end of the 13th Bak’tun of the Mayan solar calendar supposedly foretold the world’s end. Here, whales are the cause of humanity’s downfall.
