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Rare, unpublished selections by this yet to be discovered Beat poet athelete and revolutionary pacifist.
Robert Kaffke's "deathkick", a selection of his poetry written circa 1960, was typed on carbons and originally assembled in a spiral-bound 1st edition of 5 copies. The book remained lost until 1997 when serendipitously I found one that had stayed dry in a friend's Frog Pond barn near Little River, California.
Who was Robert Kaffke? In the 50's he was a welterweight boxer with the ring name of Rubi, his mother's maiden name. Managed by Sid Flaherty, he sparred with Bobo Olson. At his peak he won the Golden Gloves. A painful defeat made him decide to leave the ring, a turning point that is the basis of his 1959 poem "The Rube".
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The Rube
He moves in the ring with the stealth of a panther.
Soft shoes slide on canvas,
every muscle toned for the kill!
The rosin in nostrils,
the blinding light obliterating all save his opponent.
Only one goal, one desire.
He cuts his foe to the core,
then suddenly... a terrible blow.
Rube goes down, on the brink of victory.
The killer vanquished.
The pounding of head on mat.
A thousand years in ten seconds.
All the world’s virgins, dead.
He rises only to collapse again.
It is fin.
The cheers are jeers.
The might is over.
Robert of the Rubi is no more.
Only a weary husk of a man, a boy.
Mother where are you. Where are you.
Rube is down. Down the perjured states of
eternity, but he shall come back, he must.
I’ve been waiting sometime, but he will come.
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A natural athlete, good at pole-vaulting, football and the aforementioned sweet science (boxing), Kaffke ultimately chose to concentrate on evolving and expressing his inexhaustible curiosity and intellect. "Sheldon and I" is a brutal yet heartfelt vignette that vividly captures the hard feelings that can arise between two friends. Inspired by a wine fueled argument that culminated in an appointment to duel at dawn, no one showed up, both likely sleeping off the effects of the cheap red wine instead. SHELDON AND I
We duel on the concourse below the Palace of the Legion of Honor on mist filled grass.
The slope is gentle and the quiet fog moves up our legs.
At the dawn there is little activity amongst the animals, only the sound of a few birds, the clanging of our sabers.
Sheldon is perspiring freely as he labors silently on the lawn.
His jowled dark faces grimaces at the effort of fencing. He is an honest boy with a heavy life. I love Shel. I do not want to kill him. Yet he persists in his actions. His shoulders are rounded and he is not fast. But his perception is sharp,omniscient. He is proud and understanding. It is his pride that keeps him in this contest of death.
In the distance of the park, the cry of a crow.
I score!
Shel has been cut slightly on the cheek and the blood trickles. His face now is white, intense in his fury. He loses his agility as he strives for power. This will prove his downfall, for my forte is deftness at counter-attack.
The battle has continued endlessly. I myself can feel the stages of exhaustion. It will be impossible to continue the duel without scoring a decisive blow.
Shel is now exerting every ounce of energy he possesses. His wild swings are, at times dangerous.
I catch him in the abdomen with a bad cut. He gasps.
The crimson shirt tattered useless.
I can see him lose strength rapidly as the blood flows. Throw down your weapon you fool. Only one more strike and it is finished.
Shel.
I am hit. The ground comes roaring up at me.
Blood in my eyes. Hang on. I am on my knees
Shel standing over me. Shel I love you.
He is taking a mighty swing to decapitate me.
God.
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Kaffke verses like "North Beach Playboy" are staccato jabs written during the end game being played out of in the end game of San Fran's beat scene. The pounding pavement he criss-crossed in 1959 were awash in green death (Rainier ale) and junk food, the cruel diet found in all-night North Beach dives like Mike's Pool Hall.
Trying his hand at painting after a course at the San Francisco Art Institute didn't prevent the cut throat calumny of his cynical companions. One evening in North Beach Kaffke sold an oil painting to a football buddy for $5 to buy his evening's libation, the incident becoming the source of a particularly vivid poem. Kaffke soon found his friends publicly taking a squirt on that same painting. NORTH BEACH PLAYBOY
From the depths of perdition
rose a Prince
on a black stallion,
and his name was Rubi.
Rubi? Ha!
His name was Macabre
and he came dancing down Grant and Broadway
a fat Havana in his mouth,
shrieking where oh where
are the college idiot,
the facetious woman,
the Bohemian phony
the conformist,
the nonconformist,
the dishonest and the ignorant,
the whore and the homo,
the intellectual binary bastard.
They're all here.
Mr. Macabre with the hellions of sadism
dressed in gingham
awaiting your pleasure
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DEATHKICK
On the white corridor he stalks
His eyes always on me,
But worst of all he sits
Across from me
Encaged in my cell.
And all the while I wonder,
Who might he be.
Not the guards,
Nor the devil
Who can he be?
What foreboding of evil is this,
What foul venom cast upon my heart
Quakes the very soul itself,
Withers mind and body.
The Specter pursues
Dauntedley without aversion,
Who is He I ask.
I had a little talk with a stranger
last night.
Yet he was no stranger at all.
I woke up late, the room choked
My body wet with sweat.
A cadaver lay beside me
Clutching my hand.
The hulks of eyes and eternal grin.
Odd, he looks like me,
Am I dead?
I scream, but my hand is locked
And nobody hears me
anymore
-robert kaffke 1960
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The above clipping includes Kaffke in the crowded courtroom of March 1964 following the Cadillac civil rights auto row sit-in where he was busted along with S.F. D.A. Terence Hallinan, a boxer himself formerly known as K.O. Kaffke was at the '64 Sheraton Palace Hotel civil rights sit-in, and at Times Square's anti Vietnam war sit-in of 1967. Events of 1968 involving Robert Kaffke will require an additional page if not an entire website!
Throughout the '60s and beyond, Kaffke was on the road. He made friends from all walks of society everywhere he went,. Some of his last letters were scrawled on scraps of paper that were published in the Marin IJ. He ran unsuccessfully for a seat on the Sausalito city council as a candidate representing the waterfront community in 1980. Kaffke's politics, philosophy and poetry all ended one cold and lonely night in 1983. By then I fear he may have been neglecting to eat properly after taking his essential daily insulin. Living on his boat in Sausalito, the loosely run harbor Napa St. Pier became rundown and unable to steadily supply basic amenities to paying boarders, problems which were especially hard on Roberto in the stormy winter of 1982 -1983. He died of hypothermia and insulin shock on the unheated boat. He was survived by his beloved Appaloosa "Pepper's Eagle" that he maintained in Woodacre and engaged in competitive jumping right up until the very end.
I miss my Father. When I was 9, he introduced me to legendary landmarks e.g. The Tides bookstore in Sausalito, City Lights bookstore in North Beach, the beloved Surf Theatre repertory, the universities of Mexico City and San Francisco (State College) in '63.
"Wise up, Kenny", my Dad used to say. This web archive I've assembled to honor his spirit would have made him proud.
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