"Prizes," by Hans Ostrom

Paradigm-shift 327.B.3 (revised)
stipulates that anyone expressing
or harboring interest in winning
prestigious prizes, awards, honors,
etc., shall receive it or them. Oscars,
Nobels, National Book Awards,
Pulitzers, Grammies, Laureates,
Man Booker Prizes, Woman Booker
Prizes, Dude Booger Prizes, etc.

After a brief period of mass-elation,
everyone will become unenthusiastic
about such crap. Total devaluation
of such prizes will ensue (the process
began long ago, truth to tell).

Whether more important matters
shall occupy us . . . shall remain
something else to hope for.

At least celebrity will come
to look like a deflated soccer-ball
withering on a dry lake-bed.



hans ostrom

"Anatomy of a Common Misfit," by Hans Ostrom

Sometimes he observes
neighbors, how they drive cars,
converse with each other, walk,
stand, live; and it seems to him

they're really comfortable
with these tasks of living.

He feels awkward by comparison;
and he compares. He feels
not comfortable.

He wishes he had sought
special training in his 20s,
not on the tasks themselves
(he knows how to do them,
and he does them)
but in the being-comfortable
part. Comfort with what
is alleged to be routine.

Now he can't change,
even if he wanted to.
The most he can do
is pretend to have
adapted properly. And
that's not so bad. He'll
leave genuine easy
living to the neighbors,
whom he waves at
in terribly awkward ways,
for example.

He belongs to a demotic
species--the Common Misfit.


hans ostrom 2014

"The Day's End," by Charles Baudelaire

Poems by Carter Monroe

Carter Monroe is a fine poet as well as a small-press publisher of poetry and fiction. Here is a link to some of his work, including the poem, "Ten Beers and Six Cigarettes":

link to poems

Tim Earley

Tim Earley is a fine contemporary poet. Here is a link to some of his work:


link to book

http://horselesspress.org/2013/12/18/poems-descriptive-of-rural-life-and-scenery-by-tim-earley/

"Autumn Movement," by Carl Sandburg

"The Pool," by H.D.

Diversity and Liberal Arts Colleges

A link to a piece about (the lack of) diversity, including economic diversity, at Whitman College. Implicitly the piece touches on a problem most liberal arts colleges now face.

http://www.theawl.com/2014/09/how-whitman-college-is-destroying-itself

Chekhov's Advice on Playwriting (letter to A.P. Chekhov)

"To a Child Dancing in the Wind," by W.B. Yeats

"The Cabin at Lavezolla Creek," by Hans Ostrom

When we built the Jones cabin
up Lavezolla Creek, summer,
Sierra Nevada, we left home
in the loaded pickup and worked
ten-hour days. The droning drive
in the '69 Ford F-100
took an hour one way.

The Old Man was nearing 60 years
then. At noon he'd take a cat-nap
on the plywood sub-floor, his silver
lunch-bucket the pillow, his hat
over his eyes. Snored. I remember
something like pity arising in me.
Now I'm sixty, the Old Man's been dead
a long time, and I ended up with
the green Ford pickup, which people
think is "cool." The recall

of bright summer, big conifers,
the quick creek, and work to make
you bone tired seems now like
something that will disappear soon,
like a butterfly or pine-pollen
floating in lustrous air. These tributary
memories that shape our maps
of ourselves disappear as we do.
No one will remember that the Old Man
and I were the crew.



hans ostrom 2014

"The Difference Between Despair and Fear," by Hans Ostrom

"Images Coalesce," by Hans Ostrom

I have come to believe
(note somber rhetoric)
that when the images
don't coalesce (there
is a chrome fender in
manzanita, a desire in me
to seem clever, billions
of objects and animals,
blue fabric, scalded flesh,
nothing, hydro-electric
dams, nothing, no connection,
and "surrealism" is no excuse,
shut up) we need to
let them be art.

The images coalesce
because to see patterns
has been drilled into us.
Capitalize. The images
coalesce because
our brains evolved,
along with much of what's
on the surface, and our
brains change what's here,
manufacturing patterns.
(Incidentally, who am I?
No, I mean really, who
am I?) The brain is
at home, that is.


hans ostrom 2014