Wind Advisory

No, a "wind advisory" does

not mean a meteorologist
makes suggestions to wind
about its breezy business.

Here it means driven winds
coming East off the volcanically inclined
Cascade Mountains into easily
offended Puget Sound,

which usually hosts Pacific
winds from West, warm. Something
tonight will rattle, bang, or both
outside this dwelling. We

never can predict what. We'll
listen to the ragged rhythm,
the knocks and ticks, not get
up, wake to debris-filled dawn.

hans ostrom 2024

Airplane Mode

Taking off, the passenger plane

grunts like a sow and rattles
like a San Francisco streetcar.

Tacoma's port comes into view--
orange cranes, white warehouses bigger
than football pitches, a stack

puffing white smoke like
an old sailor. Shaggy green
Puget Sound island appears.

On the steel-blue water:
one fishing boat, one container ship,
both as still as sleeping cats.

Through horizontal pink and blue
smears, dark eyebrows arch:
tops of the Cascade mountain range.

Wet gridded neighborhoods
show, spotted with dark evergreens
and yellow & orange puffs

of dying leaves. Far out,
the freeway curves past
the light blue Tacoma Dome,

which looks like a hemispheric
quiz-show buzzer. Now white
clouds curtain the whole scene

& a voice cautions us
again to put all of our devices
on airplane mode.

Puget Sound, Winter

Attend the winter light along the Sound.

Recall the rivers and the runs of fish?

The Earth agrees to fail; the year’s come down.

Most days the sun, per se, cannot be found

Except in willow leaves, low clouds, and mist

Attending Winter light along the Sound.

Maybe the salmon will again astound

Us with erotic, suicidal quests

Though Earth agrees to fail and years come down.

The young that work drink hard in this hard town.

Nation slaughters nation, no peace can last,

And Earth agrees to fail as years come down.

Shall we allow all fish to run aground

And Earth to die several unnatural deaths?

Attend the Winter light along the Sound.

The Earth agrees to fail. The year’s come down.

--Hans Ostrom/2015

August Afternoon

*
*
*
*
*
*
*
August Afternoon

A breeze off Puget Sound curls
around a corner of the abode,
rushes through a line of herbal
foliage--three kinds of mint,
a stout rosemary plant, parsley,
chives, oregano, thyme, and
leathery-leafed sage. The breeze
organizes an aromatic syndicate,
which bargains collectively with
a gardener's sense of smell
on an August afternoon.


Copyright 2009 Hans Ostrom