Saturday, November 12, 2011
Friday, November 11, 2011
Lime Cove
*
*
*
Lime Cove
Charlotte sings a lullaby
to her bedroom, making sure
it's slow asleep before she
quicks herself away. Charlotte
and the night are in a kind
of clanky love. She says
to her doorbell, "Please come
in," and washes from it all
those oily index-finger prints.
Solicitations, she thinks, take up
so much of our lives. Asking,
answering. "God," she asks,
"help me to find a place in pause,
a site, a situation, for it seems
I am defeated by the business
of each day." Charlotte knows
she hasn't earned or isn't due
a special treatment. She also
knows she isn't out of line
in asking for some cease of
time, a cove carved out of
lime, where a pod of echoes
soaks itself in brine.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
*
*
Lime Cove
Charlotte sings a lullaby
to her bedroom, making sure
it's slow asleep before she
quicks herself away. Charlotte
and the night are in a kind
of clanky love. She says
to her doorbell, "Please come
in," and washes from it all
those oily index-finger prints.
Solicitations, she thinks, take up
so much of our lives. Asking,
answering. "God," she asks,
"help me to find a place in pause,
a site, a situation, for it seems
I am defeated by the business
of each day." Charlotte knows
she hasn't earned or isn't due
a special treatment. She also
knows she isn't out of line
in asking for some cease of
time, a cove carved out of
lime, where a pod of echoes
soaks itself in brine.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
How To Be A Sonnet
Re-posting one from a few years ago:
How To Be A Sonnet
You have to utter what you have to say
Iambically, and then you must transmit
Whatever poet using you that day
Decides that she or he desires to get
Across compressedly and cleverly.
However well you carry out this task,
Please know, my dear, that you'll fail utterly.
For every sonnet-sampler now will ask,
"How can this upstart thing even presume
To carve its iambs anywhere as well
As Shakespeare's little monuments that loom--
Or all the sonnets that still help to sell
Anthologies to students who view verse
As if it were a body in a hearse?"
Copyright 2007 Hans Ostrom
How To Be A Sonnet
You have to utter what you have to say
Iambically, and then you must transmit
Whatever poet using you that day
Decides that she or he desires to get
Across compressedly and cleverly.
However well you carry out this task,
Please know, my dear, that you'll fail utterly.
For every sonnet-sampler now will ask,
"How can this upstart thing even presume
To carve its iambs anywhere as well
As Shakespeare's little monuments that loom--
Or all the sonnets that still help to sell
Anthologies to students who view verse
As if it were a body in a hearse?"
Copyright 2007 Hans Ostrom
Thursday, November 10, 2011
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Self-Loathing
*
*
*
Self-Loathing
He wasn't opposed, in principle,
to self-loathing. Some people spoke
highly of the condition, as if it bore
a certain status. It's just that
he figured he couldn't afford
to give the people who disliked him
even one more team-member.
Liking himself seemed to be
the correct strategy in this world.
He knew he was no bargain. He
knew he said things like, "He's
no bargain, that's for sure,"
too much--old-fashioned expressions.
. . .And a hundred other flaws,
at least. Still: self-loathing?
No way. He didn't mind loving
his enemy, in theory, but helping
his enemy hate him? He just didn't
see how that penciled-out.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
*
*
Self-Loathing
He wasn't opposed, in principle,
to self-loathing. Some people spoke
highly of the condition, as if it bore
a certain status. It's just that
he figured he couldn't afford
to give the people who disliked him
even one more team-member.
Liking himself seemed to be
the correct strategy in this world.
He knew he was no bargain. He
knew he said things like, "He's
no bargain, that's for sure,"
too much--old-fashioned expressions.
. . .And a hundred other flaws,
at least. Still: self-loathing?
No way. He didn't mind loving
his enemy, in theory, but helping
his enemy hate him? He just didn't
see how that penciled-out.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
Rock, Paper, Scissors
*
*
*
*
Rock, Paper, Scissors
Rock: baby on your shoulder, parent--
rock your child to sleep. If you think
it takes too long, you'll know you're
wrong. Infancy, childhood, adolescence...
like a bullet train.
& Roll: a wonderful noise we
gave and received, thanks to R&B
& those blues women and men &
those folk men & women from
hills and fields and hollows,
from juke joints and plank porches.
Rocks: he grew up with them.
Boulders in the way, on the way,
of the wall, all rolled around by
glaciers and long-gone rivers.
Heat of boulders in the sun:
like touching the hard hide
of some still beast.
Paper is civilization.
Some of us lived much of our lives
on paper, feeding on words, scribbling,
scribbling. To us these pulpy tissues
were endless plains we trekked upon.
Murderous reports, condemnations,
memos, agreements, Solutions, Acts,
laws, sentences, secrets: By means of
such papers, nations ask Reckoning
and Doom to RSVP.
Scissors: a disagreement so ritualized,
it's synchronized, and so it cuts--
two people who never should
have gotten married.
Cutting clippings out--back when
newspapers were made of paper,
and of news. Back when someone,
maybe you, got noticed, noted,
in some local immediate lore.
Dear God, what are such memories for?
A paper bookmark. How thin, how fit,
how kind, how deft! Obliquely, how seductive!
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
*
*
*
Rock, Paper, Scissors
Rock: baby on your shoulder, parent--
rock your child to sleep. If you think
it takes too long, you'll know you're
wrong. Infancy, childhood, adolescence...
like a bullet train.
& Roll: a wonderful noise we
gave and received, thanks to R&B
& those blues women and men &
those folk men & women from
hills and fields and hollows,
from juke joints and plank porches.
Rocks: he grew up with them.
Boulders in the way, on the way,
of the wall, all rolled around by
glaciers and long-gone rivers.
Heat of boulders in the sun:
like touching the hard hide
of some still beast.
Paper is civilization.
Some of us lived much of our lives
on paper, feeding on words, scribbling,
scribbling. To us these pulpy tissues
were endless plains we trekked upon.
Murderous reports, condemnations,
memos, agreements, Solutions, Acts,
laws, sentences, secrets: By means of
such papers, nations ask Reckoning
and Doom to RSVP.
Scissors: a disagreement so ritualized,
it's synchronized, and so it cuts--
two people who never should
have gotten married.
Cutting clippings out--back when
newspapers were made of paper,
and of news. Back when someone,
maybe you, got noticed, noted,
in some local immediate lore.
Dear God, what are such memories for?
A paper bookmark. How thin, how fit,
how kind, how deft! Obliquely, how seductive!
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Under a Blue Umbrella
*
*
*
*
Under a Blue Umbrella
Something about opening a blue
umbrella, its handle too short, and
with some kind of tassel, made me
tell a truth to myself: You've been a fool
your whole life. I kept moving, no sense
stopping for such a flabby epiphany.
Rain pixelated puddles on black asphalt.
I sensed somewhere some machine
had pulverized my so-called achievements,
worked them back into the soil which hosts
that strange weed, ambition.
Your ridiculous clothes (at least you have
some), your absurd activities (at least
you're well enough to be foolish), your
denial of your standing appointment
with oblivion!.... This is a sample of
my extended remarks to myself.
--Not a whisper of self-pity, I am
pitifully proud to say. No whining
in the rain. Just a fool under a sad
contraption made of tinny metal
and a slippery fabric. Wind inverted
the umbrella, exposing its ribs and
my head. I struggled to re-shape
the thing. --Poor imitation of a
Buster Keaton schtick. (And does
anyone remember Buster Keaton?)
--Just a fool under a blue umbrella--
with wet shoes (at least you have shoes).
In the automobile and going home
became a way to try to minimize
further indictments of myself. There
were the flapping wipers to control,
the turn-signal, the radio . . . .
Copyright 2011
*
*
*
Under a Blue Umbrella
Something about opening a blue
umbrella, its handle too short, and
with some kind of tassel, made me
tell a truth to myself: You've been a fool
your whole life. I kept moving, no sense
stopping for such a flabby epiphany.
Rain pixelated puddles on black asphalt.
I sensed somewhere some machine
had pulverized my so-called achievements,
worked them back into the soil which hosts
that strange weed, ambition.
Your ridiculous clothes (at least you have
some), your absurd activities (at least
you're well enough to be foolish), your
denial of your standing appointment
with oblivion!.... This is a sample of
my extended remarks to myself.
--Not a whisper of self-pity, I am
pitifully proud to say. No whining
in the rain. Just a fool under a sad
contraption made of tinny metal
and a slippery fabric. Wind inverted
the umbrella, exposing its ribs and
my head. I struggled to re-shape
the thing. --Poor imitation of a
Buster Keaton schtick. (And does
anyone remember Buster Keaton?)
--Just a fool under a blue umbrella--
with wet shoes (at least you have shoes).
In the automobile and going home
became a way to try to minimize
further indictments of myself. There
were the flapping wipers to control,
the turn-signal, the radio . . . .
Copyright 2011
Monday, November 7, 2011
Playing a Landscape
*
*
*
*
Playing a Landscape
Landscape with musical notations:
a fine proposal: each time a squirrel,
toad, bear, bird, or lizard touches a note,
which could be masked as stone or leaf,
that note is played. Vast wild crops
of Be-bop! Seeds of salivation in
the breeze! Gusts rustle up cracked
chords and sprung melodies til air
is stoned with unchained jazz and
re-reverb-ed echoes. Hell yeah, painter,
paint me into this big picture. I'm
there, wet pigment in my hair;
me running around, stomping on
some quarter-notes, shouting
Hey now to all y'all, released into
a tunacy, far from this mausolemuseum
which I shall call today these Workaday Estates.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
*
*
*
Playing a Landscape
Landscape with musical notations:
a fine proposal: each time a squirrel,
toad, bear, bird, or lizard touches a note,
which could be masked as stone or leaf,
that note is played. Vast wild crops
of Be-bop! Seeds of salivation in
the breeze! Gusts rustle up cracked
chords and sprung melodies til air
is stoned with unchained jazz and
re-reverb-ed echoes. Hell yeah, painter,
paint me into this big picture. I'm
there, wet pigment in my hair;
me running around, stomping on
some quarter-notes, shouting
Hey now to all y'all, released into
a tunacy, far from this mausolemuseum
which I shall call today these Workaday Estates.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
Friday, November 4, 2011
Regarding Math
*
*
*
Regarding Math
(problems, indeed)
Among his several problems with mathematical equations
was that he had no trouble letting x be x and y be y. He
silently advised them to remain letters. He did wish for them
that they didn't have exponents sitting on their shoulders
like unseemly growths. Also a problem is that he saw
both sides of an equation as art--assemblages of parentheses,
letters, numbers, and other symbols--and he didn't care
what they stood for. They stood for the image they created.
Then there was the problem of his seeing--there, in the middle--
an equal-sign. He thought, if each side is content to be equal
to the other, who am I to intrude on this amicable truce?
They were the same, apparently, so let them be. He didn't
care to know their secrets. Forced to solve an equation,
he did so, but it never felt like success, and he never
recalls anyone explaining why equations had to be solved.
He does remember sitting next to pretty girls in math class
and smelling their hair and their thin sweaters, and looking
at their painted nails, and thinking, "Let these girls
stand for beauty. Yes, let's equate them with allure."
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
*
*
Regarding Math
(problems, indeed)
Among his several problems with mathematical equations
was that he had no trouble letting x be x and y be y. He
silently advised them to remain letters. He did wish for them
that they didn't have exponents sitting on their shoulders
like unseemly growths. Also a problem is that he saw
both sides of an equation as art--assemblages of parentheses,
letters, numbers, and other symbols--and he didn't care
what they stood for. They stood for the image they created.
Then there was the problem of his seeing--there, in the middle--
an equal-sign. He thought, if each side is content to be equal
to the other, who am I to intrude on this amicable truce?
They were the same, apparently, so let them be. He didn't
care to know their secrets. Forced to solve an equation,
he did so, but it never felt like success, and he never
recalls anyone explaining why equations had to be solved.
He does remember sitting next to pretty girls in math class
and smelling their hair and their thin sweaters, and looking
at their painted nails, and thinking, "Let these girls
stand for beauty. Yes, let's equate them with allure."
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
Harvest Blade
*
*
*
*
Harvest Blade
Hockey players in uniform float
down a river enlarged
by a massive ice-melt far away.
They hold their sticks high,
rudders without boats. Look, now:
they're followed by last year's
Queen of the Adrenalin Parade,
dressed in a gown of
acetylene blue-and-white.
She rides on a raft made
of synthetic whale-bones.
Violinists from broken
orchestras line the river-bank,
serenading all things that pass
on floods. In shallows,
fish hear strings' vibrations, shimmer;
and shiver. And the glare from the sun
is a blade. It is a harvest blade.
Copyright 2011
*
*
*
Harvest Blade
Hockey players in uniform float
down a river enlarged
by a massive ice-melt far away.
They hold their sticks high,
rudders without boats. Look, now:
they're followed by last year's
Queen of the Adrenalin Parade,
dressed in a gown of
acetylene blue-and-white.
She rides on a raft made
of synthetic whale-bones.
Violinists from broken
orchestras line the river-bank,
serenading all things that pass
on floods. In shallows,
fish hear strings' vibrations, shimmer;
and shiver. And the glare from the sun
is a blade. It is a harvest blade.
Copyright 2011
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Allen Ginsberg and Neal Cassady
This short video is amusing--Neal Cassady seems to perplex Allen Ginsberg as Cassady speaks of Armageddon and "extremists," which probably include Ginsberg:
Ginsberg and Cassady
Ginsberg and Cassady
Monday, October 31, 2011
Questions for Republican Candidates
Some questions I'd like to hear asked of the Republican presidential candidates--or any candidates [Congress, President Obama, e.g.]--in debates:
1. Do you have any close friends who live at, below, or near the poverty-line?
2. What manual-labor jobs have you held--what kind, when, and for how long?
3. Would you explain why the trickling in a "trickle-down" economy is a good thing for those being trickled upon?
4. According to generally accepted economic theory, what is the greater source of economic growth, consumer-demand (from, for example, the middle class) or very rich people?
5. Who is your favorite American poet, and why?
6. Do you have any close friends who are gay or lesbian?
7. What is a favorite novel of yours not published by an American?
8. Why do you think the budget deficit increased during the Reagan years?
9. Who is or was one of your favorite blues performers, and why?
10. In your view, does humanity face an environmental crisis? If not, please say why. If so, please provide a few details about that crisis.
11. What is one of your favorite comic feature-films, and why?
12. What is one of your favorite foreign feature-films, and why?
1. Do you have any close friends who live at, below, or near the poverty-line?
2. What manual-labor jobs have you held--what kind, when, and for how long?
3. Would you explain why the trickling in a "trickle-down" economy is a good thing for those being trickled upon?
4. According to generally accepted economic theory, what is the greater source of economic growth, consumer-demand (from, for example, the middle class) or very rich people?
5. Who is your favorite American poet, and why?
6. Do you have any close friends who are gay or lesbian?
7. What is a favorite novel of yours not published by an American?
8. Why do you think the budget deficit increased during the Reagan years?
9. Who is or was one of your favorite blues performers, and why?
10. In your view, does humanity face an environmental crisis? If not, please say why. If so, please provide a few details about that crisis.
11. What is one of your favorite comic feature-films, and why?
12. What is one of your favorite foreign feature-films, and why?
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