Risky, Rickety Bridge

It was a cafe in Time. It was

an evening in space. You two
met, talked and listened, heard
and spoke. Eyes seeing faces.
Nostrils noting aromas, Gestures,
shifts of bodies. Smiles, giggles,
frowns. Tendrils of thought
intertwining. The unfolding

took you to a precipice. Where
a thin, swaying bridge made
of rusty cables and gray boards
offered a way across a chasm,
a segment of two lives' times,
a space called risk.

Hans Ostrom 2025

The Mountains Taught

They protected you with danger,

those High Sierra Mountains.

Cliffs and snakes, rockslides,

flooded rivers, icy narrow

twisting highways, dirt

roads cut casually into hills,

hours between you and a

doctor or hospital. Chainsaws,

knives, guns, lightning,

freezing temperatures. 

Wherever you went, 

whatever you did, you kept

caution in your pocket

like a talisman. You quickly

came to equate useless

risk with lack of thought,

not with bravery. 

Hans Ostrom 2024