"To Put One Brick Upon Another," by Philip Larkin

"The Composer," by W.H. Auden

"The Waning Moon," by Percy Bysshe Shelley

Lead the Way

Take my hand, draw

me to your warmth.
Show me what you
want me to want.
Unconfuse me. Simplify,
eye to eye. I'm so tired
of being supposed to know.

So show what you know
I want, what you want.
Clearly you know. You know
clearly. Into your warmth I go--
a room, a place, a bed, a world,
a dream with walls and pillows,
perfume, talk, and linen. So
take my hand.

hans ostrom 2024

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Receiving

Tried receiving, not

broadcasting. Sat next
to a tree, took in
a breeze, leaf rustle,
taps and clicks
of shoes passing,
my lungs & heart
pumping. Walked

in a crowd as No One.
Among bodies, felt
the muscle, bone, fat
flow of fabricked bodies,
dances of passing, jostling,
slipping-bay, stop-starting.

Engines, motors, voices,
glass reflections, smoke,
all of it as it was, just
itself, not a message,
just signals received.

hans ostrom 2024

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Old Barn

Smell of sun-baked, cured,

unpainted boards. Aromas
of hay and horse manure.
Shiny tines and sweat-dyed

handles of pitchforks.
Massive cured teeth
of an ancient rusted harrow,
retired now, host to spiders.

Fat raindrops tick against
an iron roof. Under eaves
of this hall of harvest
and toil, swallows lay eggs

in mud nests. At dusk
the birds will curve and dip
down for bugs on
a cow-pond surface.

Beyond this heap of rafters
and beams and light-shafts piercing
cracks, the corn and wheat
rustle in heat.

hans ostrom 2024

They Live With Us

For the second year

in a row, a large speckle-legged
spider has anchored a silken thread
on a rain gutter,

and built a languid, relaxed
web anchored below
to a rosemary bush in front
of a large window. She's

an orb-wearver spider--
Neoscona crucifera--found
everywhee around this country.
I like to sit in a chair by the glass
and watch her. She usually perches

somewhere near the central
orb of web, plump and still,
but sometimes plucking silk
like a harpist. Yesterday,

I saw that she had built a snug,
velvety pale egg-sac. A little
purse. She touched it up
like a painter or sculptor.
Fussing with it. What does
she see when she does that?

Later, she'll lay about 1, 000
eggs in it, and it will drop
off the web into the bush,
maybe down into dirt.

She lives with us, and
we, with her. The same
can be said of so many
splendid creatures.

hans ostrom 2024

Among the Trees

In a forest, I rarely
speak to trees. A guest there,
I don't want to interrupt
their conversations.

Pine trees: often
the chattiest, gesturing
with boughs. Oaks
mumble, if that.

Old shaggy cedars
withdraw from gab,
cover themselves
in green resin blankets.

Stern fir trees speak
judgmentally, telling
neighbors to straighten
out their posture.

I think of all the roots down
there, arboreal working class.
They groan, grip rocks,
in darkness mine for water.

hans ostrom 2024

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I'M READY