Showing posts with label questions poem. Show all posts
Showing posts with label questions poem. Show all posts

Friday, November 19, 2021

Inventory after Flood

Last night the river flooded
and hauled away my answers.
I should not have stacked them
so near the bank. I'm left 

with questions stored
in small dry places, bowed
shelves, bitter boxes. So far
the roof is holding.

Rain slaps and pummels
it in surges. I start
to unpack questions.
My smashed answers

roll and twist toward
a delta or a dam or just
rocks on the way. Today
I fret and squirm and

say What are they for?
What are they for? 
This only adds to a stuffed
frustrating inventory. 


hans ostrom 2021

Monday, April 29, 2019

The Ministry of Obvious Questions

At the Ministry of Obvious Questions,
we ask why America is still full of White Supremacists,
including a certain president. Why
can't we create shelter for homeless people
huddling in tents and doorways? Why
is medicine to expensive for working-class
people to buy? One of our favorites is
What's wrong with you people? We
believe, in other words, that it all starts
with asking the obvious questions. The
Ministry of Answers has been instructed
to remain silent. Why is that?


hans ostrom 2019

Monday, June 27, 2016

Four Questions About the Future

How sophisticated does any
creature's mind have to be
to conceive of Future? Was
there an evolutionary ad-
vantage to imagining Future
and oneself in it? When
they were hiding from God
in the brush after complications
arose, how did Eve and Adam
discuss Future? What are you
going to do tomorrow?


hans ostrom 2016