My First Twitter-Poem

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I gather the Twitter phenomenon has led to the verb, "to tweet," which I guess means to post a message on Twitter. As everyone knows (I was among the last to learn this), a twitter-post (the noun must be "tweet") is limited to 140 characters.

Someone had the great idea of establishing a Twitter identity/site that features poems limited to 140 characters. The link is . . .

http://twitter.com/twitlaureate


I found the new poetic form to be irresistible. Here is my first attempt:

One hundred forty characters: a small town of letters, no mayor, no stop-lights, one grocery store, two bars. One fire truck--has flat tire.

There's so much to like about this form (not necessarily about my poem, I grant). It demands compression, and while you're composing, Twitter counts the characters for you, so you are writing and revising at the same time, as well as serving the muse, Arithmetic. I'm Matsuo Basho would not only have blogged but would have also tweeted or twittered or twicked or tweeted.

Because I'm as old as dirt (see dirt in robin's mouth above), I associate "tweet" with the song, "Rockin' Robin," in which "all the little birdies on Jay-Bird Street love to hear the robin go tweet, tweet, tweet." That song usually made me laugh.

The Latest Spring

The Latest Spring

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Well, we were all out in the icy air,

behaving as if Spring weren't later

than we'd ever not seen it. I had seeds

to plant and seeds to feed birds. I

loaded up the bird-feeder, looked up,

and saw a fat robin squatting on

the roof, hunkered down. It seemed

too cold to move. It looked at me.

I looked at it. Chilled and in

no mood to plant, I gave up and went

inside. Birds and I have always

gotten along just fine. I'm not sure

why. Maybe we interpret weather

similarly, and we try to say busy.

They weren't moving around

much today. Me, neither.

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Copyright 2009 Hans Ostrom

Light Verse for the Birds

I've been observing starlings for quite some time. Maybe you've seen them; they often lift off from the ground and take off in a great cloud of hundreds, and the cloud then undulates in what seems to be a coordinated way. This take-off and the undulating cloud are especially startling and pleasing at dusk. The phenomena are quite something to watch.

A book on birds I have describes starlings as "garrulous." I think they can be pretty aggressive around other birds, although I doubt crows or eagles take them seriously. A side note: the fictional detective and gourmand Nero Wolfe likes to have his chef, Fritz, prepare a meal of roasted starlings. Yikes. I have not dined on starlings. Nor do I know anyone non-fictional who has done so. Anyway, pictured here is a starling. I've always appreciated the speckling and the deeply yellow beak.

And here, for a bit of a glum Tuesday, is some light verse regarding birds, a poem I hope will lighten your load if you've had a tough day, as the cashier at the local supermarket did in fact have; she told me 4 people had called in sick, and at the late hour of 6:00 p.m., she hadn't yet had a lunch-break. So a special tip of the cap goes out to working folk, especially those who've been on their feet all day.

For the Birds

Here's to starlings
who travel in clouds,
and unsubtle ravens,
who caw in louds.

Here's to robins,
who run-and-then-stop,
and jays climbing trees
hop by hop.

Here's to songbirds,
sharp and small.
Hell, here's to birds--
let's toast them all,

including extinct ones,
an awful loss,
moreso because the cause
was likely us.

But let's not end there.
It's too sad.
Think of your favorite bird.
Be glad.

Hans Ostrom 2008 Hans Ostrom