Tag: Karl Koweski

THE POLISH HAMMER POETRY CORNER: I May Not Control the Narrative, But Occasionally I Supervise It by Karl Koweski

I May Not Control the Narrative, But Occasionally I Supervise It For four and a half years I supervised the assembly plant at Hydra Hydraulics. It wasn’t what I set out to do with this life, but I settled into it easily enough. I even grew to like it. The job appealed to the lazier …

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THE POLISH HAMMER POETRY CORNER: If You’re Reading This, Then I Must Have Managed to Write a Column Yesterday by Karl Koweski

If You’re Reading This, Then I Must Have Managed to Write a Column Yesterday So, my plan for last weekend ideally involved relaxing for hours on the front porch with my feet propped up and a book in my lap. I even had my clothes picked out, white linen trousers and a thin sky-blue button-down …

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THE POLISH HAMMER POETRY CORNER: You’ve Been Milted by Karl Koweski

You’ve Been Milted I’ve managed to escape the factory for two whole days and I’m intent on wiling the hours away in as lazy a manner as I can muster, sitting beside my wife on the front porch, watching the world pass by. For this brief moment, I experience the closest sensation to contentment the …

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THE POLISH HAMMER POETRY CORNER: Everybody Else is Stacking Cash, So Why Ain’t I? by Karl Koweski

Everybody Else is Stacking Cash, So Why Ain’t I?             How much money you got stashed in your bank account?             What’s your 401K looking like?             Do you have at least four months’ salary put back in savings in case you lose your job?             These are the sort of questions my wife bombards …

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THE POLISH HAMMER POETRY CORNER: The Unpredictability of Fate by Karl Koweski

The Unpredictability of Fate Or An Open Letter to Billy Zane   A wiser man than I once said that fate was a monkey. I’m inclined to agree. I read a news article the other day about a local man who died of a hatchet chop to the throat last week while on “a journey …

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THE POLISH HAMMER POETRY CORNER: Pierogi Queens and The Polish Precision Lawn Mower Team by Karl Koweski

Pierogi Queens and The Polish Precision Lawn Mower Team   It was so fucking hot, Chicago melted. Lake Michigan evaporated leaving behind three startled carp and a land-locked yachtsman, half-crazed from the heat. Fifteen miles to the southeast, the annual Pierogi Fest was gearing up in defiance of the sweltering sun suspended ten feet above …

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THE POLISH HAMMER POETRY CORNER: Splitting Heirs by Karl Koweski

Splitting Heirs It occurs to me, probably more often than it should, that I have yet to see my twenty-two-year-old son in the company of a female. His life is his own, of course, to do with as he sees fit, but I see a lot of me in a lot of him. So, why …

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THE POLISH HAMMER POETRY CORNER: Hey, Did I Ever Tell You I’m a Writer? by Karl Koweski

Hey, Did I Ever Tell You I’m a Writer?   On casual Fridays while most of my co-workers on the office side of the factory wall eschew collared shirts for Tees emblazoned with the insignia of their favorite sports team, I pimp a shirt advertising the cover of my latest short story collection, Thrift Store …

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THE POLISH HAMMER POETRY CORNER: Gramma K’s Apocalypse by Karl Koweski

Gramma K’s Apocalypse I would have rather been anywhere other than where I was, sprawled on the olive shag carpeting of Gramma K’s efficiency apartment, cringing beneath the beatific gaze of Pope John Paul II peering down from a three-year-old calendar tacked to the nicotine-stained wall. A Love Boat rerun played on the television. It …

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THE POLISH HAMMER POETRY CORNER: The Thomas Jefferson of the Pell Grant Elites by Karl Koweski

The Thomas Jefferson of the Pell Grant Elites   For a brief period, I was a community college scholar. This should come as no surprise to anyone who knew me as a fifth-grade genius. During the intervening years, I may have fallen off the educational map. Spectacularly some would say, through my year as an …

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