(California: April 1979)
saw a shadow push into
the moon,
which took on a planet’s
gravitas,
losing its varicose
craters, its
coin’s gloss. Then its yellow
turned brown and red
enough
to make a farmer look
at it
as arable space. We
enjoyed
the eclipse’s math and
chance,
tried to focus
binoculars
using a rooftop TV
antenna
as approximative point.
We tried to shape our
minds
around such fear and
magic
as hunters/gatherers
may have felt. We
failed.
We joked, and after midnight,
we opened doors of our
several
abodes in a
college-town stucco
hive. We set clocks,
listened to household
engines,
to music from vinyl
undulating on a
turn-table like glassy
harbor
water. Our dreams
orbited desire.
Hans Ostrom 1979/2017
