A friend sent a link to an article in Salon about America's war criminals:
War Criminals
Monday, February 22, 2010
Community Colleges and Poetry
. . . And here is a link to U.S. Poet Laureate Kay Ryan's poetry project, which includes work with community colleges:
Kay Ryan/Community Colleges
I must now hail Sierra College, the community college I attended way back when. Thanks especially to several fine English teachers there and one fine philosophy teacher, from whom I took a two-semester history of philosophy course.
Kay Ryan/Community Colleges
I must now hail Sierra College, the community college I attended way back when. Thanks especially to several fine English teachers there and one fine philosophy teacher, from whom I took a two-semester history of philosophy course.
Library of Congress Site: Black History Month
Here is a link to a "page" on the U.S. Library of Congress site that describes a variety of projects, exhibits, and archives connected to Black History Month:
Library of Congress
Library of Congress
Friday, February 19, 2010
Southeastern Kansas
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Southeastern Kansas
Grains of agrarian
patience sway, shimmer,
shall become bread
of memory. Clouds
have purchased sky.
Prairie is lightning-
lacerated. Grassy
hills take as long
to curve as they will.
Expanse fascinates.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
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Southeastern Kansas
Grains of agrarian
patience sway, shimmer,
shall become bread
of memory. Clouds
have purchased sky.
Prairie is lightning-
lacerated. Grassy
hills take as long
to curve as they will.
Expanse fascinates.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Great Site for International Poetry
Here's a link to a fine site for contemporary poetry around the world:
International Poetry Web
Once there, you may simply select a country from the drop-down menu, go to that page, and find dozens of poets.
Great stuff.
International Poetry Web
Once there, you may simply select a country from the drop-down menu, go to that page, and find dozens of poets.
Great stuff.
Monday, February 15, 2010
Say There's A Ship
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Say There's A Ship
Say there's a ship we can take out
on the sea of our lives. Say we can
cast nets and lines and thus retrieve
sources of regret, despair, haul them
on board, apologize, repair--make things
right. Tell it so we can find
unrecoverable people out there. They stand
or sit in boats, close enough to see,
to hail. Make it so that ocean's not just
time or loss, memory or change, failure or
death. We know that sort of ocean well.
Talk about the joy we'll feel. Describe
the laughter, redemptive weeping, songs
and delight. Now a harder part: tell us
how to get there. Please tell us how
to go down to that ship, get on.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
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Say There's A Ship
Say there's a ship we can take out
on the sea of our lives. Say we can
cast nets and lines and thus retrieve
sources of regret, despair, haul them
on board, apologize, repair--make things
right. Tell it so we can find
unrecoverable people out there. They stand
or sit in boats, close enough to see,
to hail. Make it so that ocean's not just
time or loss, memory or change, failure or
death. We know that sort of ocean well.
Talk about the joy we'll feel. Describe
the laughter, redemptive weeping, songs
and delight. Now a harder part: tell us
how to get there. Please tell us how
to go down to that ship, get on.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
Hughes and Hurston on Haiti
Haiti's being in the news, to understate things awfully much, has reminded me that two Harlem Renaissance authors, Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston, developed a great interest in that nation.
An anthropologist as well as a fiction-writer, Hurston wrote the study: Tell My Horse: Voodoo and Life in Haiti and Jamaica. It was reissued in 2008.
Hughes wrote a play, Troubled Island, which concerns the Haitian rebel leader, Jean-Jacques Dessalines, who helped defeat the army Napoleon had sent to Haiti and who later became emperor of Haiti. His dates are 1758-1806. Later, the composer William Grant Still and Hughes (as librettist) collaborated on the opera, Troubled Island.
An anthropologist as well as a fiction-writer, Hurston wrote the study: Tell My Horse: Voodoo and Life in Haiti and Jamaica. It was reissued in 2008.
Hughes wrote a play, Troubled Island, which concerns the Haitian rebel leader, Jean-Jacques Dessalines, who helped defeat the army Napoleon had sent to Haiti and who later became emperor of Haiti. His dates are 1758-1806. Later, the composer William Grant Still and Hughes (as librettist) collaborated on the opera, Troubled Island.
Evening Hatch
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Evening Hatch
An evening hatch of gnats rose from the river
in a cloud. One gnat flew to a blue bluff,
landed there, pushed against infinite,
immovable stone mass. The gnat
fell away and down toward a pool,
out of which erupted a rainbow trout,
which snatched and swallowed the gnat.
I will have had less effect on things than
this gnat. It's good to meditate on that.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
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Evening Hatch
An evening hatch of gnats rose from the river
in a cloud. One gnat flew to a blue bluff,
landed there, pushed against infinite,
immovable stone mass. The gnat
fell away and down toward a pool,
out of which erupted a rainbow trout,
which snatched and swallowed the gnat.
I will have had less effect on things than
this gnat. It's good to meditate on that.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
Lucille Clifton Passes
It is sad that poet Lucille Clifton passed on a few days ago. She was a poet of great wit and insight.
Here are two links to more information about her, one a recent article following her death, the other from poets. org:
Clifton article
Clifton on Poets.org
This is a good day to re-read some of her poems.
Here are two links to more information about her, one a recent article following her death, the other from poets. org:
Clifton article
Clifton on Poets.org
This is a good day to re-read some of her poems.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Black History Quiz and Africlassical.com
Should you have a hankering to take a quiz on Black history, then here's a link you might like to follow:
Black History Quiz
The quiz appears on the site, Africlassical.com, which explores the African and African American presence in classical music.
The site has a companion blog, which (finally, the self-serving part) kindly mentioned an upcoming musical program I helped to put together. Actually, the site borrowed a notice from another blog (thanks, Professor O'Neil)--ah, the complications of the web.
Langston Hughes/Awilda Verdejo
Black History Quiz
The quiz appears on the site, Africlassical.com, which explores the African and African American presence in classical music.
The site has a companion blog, which (finally, the self-serving part) kindly mentioned an upcoming musical program I helped to put together. Actually, the site borrowed a notice from another blog (thanks, Professor O'Neil)--ah, the complications of the web.
Langston Hughes/Awilda Verdejo
Friday, February 12, 2010
President Clinton Reads "The Concord Hymn"
Here is a link to a video of President Clinton reading Ralph Waldo Emerson's "The Concord Hymn," as part of the "Favorite Poem" project:
Clinton reads Concord Hymn
It was good to hear that the former President is doing well after a visit to the hospital.
As to his other poetic tastes, the CBS site includes The Collected Poems of W.B. Yeats on his list of favorite books.
Clinton reads Concord Hymn
It was good to hear that the former President is doing well after a visit to the hospital.
As to his other poetic tastes, the CBS site includes The Collected Poems of W.B. Yeats on his list of favorite books.
African American Crime Fiction
Probably like most of you, I've been reading detective fiction since I was in my early teens. I think I received the Doubleday collected Holmes stories as a gift from my parents when I was about 16.
Later, I wrote and published one mystery novel, featuring a rural sheriff as the detective.
And I've taught a class on detective fiction a few times. One interesting aspect of such a class is that you get some students who take simply because they have been reading in the genre independent of "school" work. In a sense they are connoisseurs.
Now I'm considering developing a course on African American detective fiction, or at least I'm taking steps toward the consideration. In the process, I discovered a few recent anthologies, including
African American Crime and Mystery Stories, edited by Eleanor Taylor Bland. I'm enjoying it a lot. Here's a link:
anthology
Later, I wrote and published one mystery novel, featuring a rural sheriff as the detective.
And I've taught a class on detective fiction a few times. One interesting aspect of such a class is that you get some students who take simply because they have been reading in the genre independent of "school" work. In a sense they are connoisseurs.
Now I'm considering developing a course on African American detective fiction, or at least I'm taking steps toward the consideration. In the process, I discovered a few recent anthologies, including
African American Crime and Mystery Stories, edited by Eleanor Taylor Bland. I'm enjoying it a lot. Here's a link:
anthology
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