"Who Am I?" by Carl Sandburg

Reading/video of a short poem by Carl Sandburg:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rybg3P86B8g

"Emmett Till," poem by James Emanuel

This poem crushes me. A recording/video. James Emanuel (1921-1913) was a fine poet who wrote, among other things, jazz haiku. He was also a scholar and professor who taught in the U.S. and abroad. He also wrote a book about Langston Hughes. I wish I had met him.

link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcPm3zTMVYo

"Let America Be America Again," Langston Hughes

A video/reading (from quite a while ago) of one of Langston Hughes's many protest poems, this one with a hopeful spirit: "Let America Be America Again":

link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78EKb0znCTI&t=162s

"Hammer," by Carl Sandburg

Recording/video of short poem by Carl Sandburg, "Hammer."  Link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JYxTInrG-bE

"Green," by D.H. Lawrence

A reading + video of a short poem by D.H. Lawrence. Link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjKiY2tFRrM

"Alive Today With You" (song)

Recording of Roger Illsley performing "Alive Today With You," for which he wrote the music, and I wrote the lyrics:

link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jv6djgQLPEU

"Silence," by e.e. cummings

A recording/video of a very short poem by e.e. cummings, "Silence."

The link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTNKM0znIrM

"Night, and I Traveling," by Joseph Campbell

A short poetry-video of "Night, and I Traveling," by the Irish poet Joseph Campbell (1879-1944), not the myth/archetype scholar Joseph Campbell. Here is a link:

"Night, and I Traveling"

"I Walked in a Desert," by Stephen Crane

It appears I'm back to recording poetry for Youtube. This is a very short poem by Stephen Crane:

"I Walked in a Desert"

Quiet Whiteness

(for Walter Scott, South Carolina,  George Floyd, 
Minneapolis, and uncounted others)   


If you've ever asked yourself
what we did to deserve these
depraved politicians of ours,
you may have considered
genocide of the indigenous
people, slavery, Northern investment
in slavery, Jim Crow, Northern
acceptance of Jim Crow, lynching,
child labor, eugenics,
imperial lust, monopolies,
Chinese expulsion, Japanese
internment, anti-Semitism,
McCarthyism, the blasting of
air, land, water, and people.
We've done everything to deserve
the depraved, you might have thought
in a moment of clarity, or
in a moment of despair (same
difference?) 

White supremacy remains robust;
that is the truth. The President
is the Klan, except with more
power. Racism thrives
not just because of
psychopaths and the cynical
who bait them, but because of
quiet whiteness:

the indifference, the privileged
numbness, the excuses of whites
who know
better but cast out the knowledge
because it asks too much.
The smug passivity
of whites who won't educate
themselves. The endless string
of lame excuses, casuistry,
deflections, and weaselly rationales.

Quite whiteness likes these
politicians. Otherwise,
they would be intolerable
in 2015 or 2020 or
1950 or 2050. Any year.
So much would be
intolerable, including
quiet whiteness itself.

If you've ever asked yourself
when the white choruses will
stand up and sing, stand up and
shout, get up and make damn sure
this depravity's demolished,
maybe in a moment of clear
despair the word
(printed in white against
a black background)    'NEVER, '
came to mind. Don't
accept it.


hans ostrom 2015/2020

Life Is Just a Breath

Life is just a breath,

A breath in empty space,

Until love takes the breath

Away and to a different place.

hans ostrom 2020

Becoming a Spider

Maybe I'll turn
into a spider
at the end
and follow
the silk filament
up and up
all the way
into the clearest
sunny sky
I've seen
since childhood.


hans ostrom 2020

From A Diary of the Plague Year (15)

People are making
each other sick.
They're always
making each other sick,
and now the plague.

I'm sure in the lost
notes of Moses and
background material
for other religions
we'll find discarded
commandments,
entreaties, and revelations
along the lines of
Don't make each other sick.

A brainless virus is making
us make each other sick.
Hold the hubris.

After we corral this epidemic
(said the American), we need
a new treaty in which all
countries agree not to make
each other sick if they can
help it. They can help it.

I am convinced (and I
daresay so are you) that
in spite of recent setbacks
we're headed for a healthier
phase of so-called civilization.


hans ostrom 2020