Wednesday, June 29, 2022

The Genre of Sad Erotica

 In the genre of sad erotica, main
characters are tired and smell bad.
They feel too fat or too thin, too old,
too young or too middling. They touch
their bodies like they handle a heap of laundry.

They're hungry but too tired from work
to cook. Could be no one's there
to cook for them. Or someone's there
but mutual indifference grinds
the ambience like a glacier.

Oh, a bath would feel great but only after
booze or weed. Food delivered?
Microwave launched, cans slashed open?
Leftovers devoured like a dog's breakfast?

They sleep in front of a screen and wake
up confused, then vacant. So where's the
erotica?
 Well, maybe as bath or shower
stimulates flab and muscle, they think about

sex!
 They think about what sex might
bring. Oblivion of lust, the feeling
of being someone (well, something,
anyway) someone wants to touch. Alas,

in sad erotica, grotesquely realistic,
people get out of the shower and dry
themselves and put on cotton, linen,
or wool. Likely worn several nights
in a row. They walk slowly to a bed
or couch and fall, exhaling like beasts.

In sleep, maybe dreams of purple
romance, sizzling mystery, and molten
sex will riot. Finally, some action.

Saturday, June 25, 2022

Giving Blood

 "We use your blood for babies," says the nurse.
“Give them my best,” I say. She nearly smiles.

The opaque bag darkens shadow-red
with my corpuscular tithing. Blood's

darkness always surprises me, suggests how
blood wells up from mineral earth like lava.

The blood-room’s hushed, as if we lying
on padded tables were sacrificial goats

with slit throats and the strong nurses, priests.
A tall woman or short man who used to be

a baby will stroll in flowered Paris one
day, pulsing traces of my blood, which

is O-Negative and CMV-Negative. My heart
never thought to teach me what these words

and letters mean. Do vampires carry all
types of blood, and is that why they’re

so pale and mean and unproductive?
I mean, get out of the casket, Drac,

go to bloodoholic rehab, give back to
the community. Just don’t donate blood,

and stay the hell away from babies...

Finished, I'm offered a cookie and juice.


hans ostrom 2022

Friday, June 24, 2022

"Hallelujah, Gloria," music video

 A glum day for multiple reasons. So I decided to make a lowest budget music video of a song that Roger Illsley (music) and I (lyrics) wrote that Roger recorded. We hope it's smile-worthy. Well, here it is:

"Hallelujah, Gloria"

Thursday, June 23, 2022

"In 1940," by Anna Akhmatova

 The Penguin Selected Poems of hers, translated by D.M. Thomas, is a great intro to her poetry in English. Somehow she survived WW2 and Stalin's terror--many of her compatriots did not. The Akhmatova House in St. Petersburg, Russia, is now a museum. And there is a Joseph Brodsky room near the entry. You go through a small tunnel just off the street to get to the house, and the walls are covered with poetry graffiti. It's as if everyone has agreed to put only poetry graffiti up there; pretty cool. 

A reading of a short portion of "In 1940", with short video:

Akhmatova poem



Sunday, June 19, 2022

Ragusa, Sicily: Festival Blues

At the Alta Villa Trattoria in Ragusa,
Sicily, as the St. Giorgio fest rolls
to a finish, you listen to small brass
bands haul their marches through
sun heat up toward the baroque 
cathedral, which manages to seem
at once imposing and cute. It's where

a solid silver ark holds "the bones
of various saints," an old man told you. 
George, the saint that counts, remains
forever young in painted wood, gentle
face, white horse, sharp lance. Later,

in an evening without breeze, everyone's
had about enough of whatever they thought
they'd come for in the festival. A hard woman
with a fish tattoo stuffs her phone in her jeans,
disgusted. She'll argue with anyone who 

wants to and some who don't. A toothless
ex-boxer is spruced up in an official white
shirt and red bandana. The Alta Villa 
Trattoria's mostly for locals. It's a living.
Nearby, the guy who sells hand-made
puppets plays Ella Fitzgerald all day,

so I stay, buying enough coffee & water,
salads &sandwiches, & bottles &
bottles of water to pay my way. 


"Memory of My Father," by Patrick Kavanagh

 Reading/video of a short poem by Patrick Kavanagh (1904-1967), well known Irish poet and novelist:

"Memory of My Father" video

Saturday, June 18, 2022

Closing Time

 

Tonight my cabaret of fears

glowed and hummed.

A band played anxiety

in sharp keys. We asked

the bartender to remove

his Death costume and put

away the scythe. Insulted,

he yelled, “Drink up, last call!”

A good time was not had by all.


hans ostrom 2022

Sunday, June 12, 2022

Treasure Enough

 slices of yellow peach

with a few blueberries

in a bowl. some water

and homemade bread.


outside, birds make

raucous noise, manic

after rain-showers. all

this is treasure enough.



hans ostrom 2022

Monday, June 6, 2022

Sunday, June 5, 2022

The Bees Work in the Rain

The bees work in the rain. Some climb

Into the orange of poppies, some

Into the blue and purple lavender.


So cold, so wet so late this year.

We have the Winter blues in June,

While elsewhere draught and fire say


The future's now. Do not begrudge the rain,

We whisper to our consciences, which will

Not hear. I dive into the weeding,


Get wet and chill and caked with mud.

But it's all right, as everything

From peonies to roses now


Is bursting into bright, and bees

Work in the rain and don't complain,

Must move the nectar now into the hives.


hans ostrom 2022

Concerning Bob the Bull

         (Lincoln, California)


I'm feeding sweet green clover

to a black and white bull

under powder blue sky. Through


silver fencing, I poke the offering,

a gesture of friendship to Bob

the bull, bedeviled by black flies


and close farm heat. Bob stares

and sniffs. Leans into me, almost

breaks my hand--a gesture


of friendship. I talk, he listens.

He snorts, sucks cud, and grunts.

I listen. I poke more green past


that glue-thick slobber on his black

lips, past his keyboard of square

ivory teeth and onto a pale pink


slab of tongue. Bob accepts

the clover without chewing.

He has a lot going on.


His patience in the midst

of fly-swarms and de-horning

outstrips Zen perfection. I tell


Bob of his greatness. Mourn

with him his lack of cow

companionship. His mucous


drips like icicle melt. We'll not

meet again--a scheduling thing.

I feel a sadness as sweet as


Bob's inner pools of cud.

How fine it would be one day

to hear Bob's story from Bob.


hans ostrom 2022

Saturday, June 4, 2022

Abandoned Gold Mine

In the mine, looking at gray 

soil oozing water,

you feel the folly of digging

a hole in a mountain and hoping

wooden beams and air will hold up

all the rock above you. Mining

is faith. You look at rusted


iron tracks and the one tiny-

wheeled ore car no one stole yet.

This is a burrow where the Gold Rush

came to die. Yet even you,

fever -free, son and grandson

of gold miners, look at quartz

around your feet and want

to see deep yellow flecks,

desperately want gold to be.


Building, blasting, mucking,

loading, pushing, lifting. Sucking

rock dust in, coughing it out.

Stripping at end of day to show

you didn't steal high-grade ore.

Cuts, contusions. That's the search,

the work. The mine was not theirs.


Decades later, you stand in the cool

tomb and feel the drive that drove

them all here to lay down tracks

to trek into a mountain's dream.


hans ostrom 2022

Sunday, May 29, 2022

Simple Wishes

I wish you warm 
copper dreams. I
wish you iron strength
on hardest days. May
ways you move

through life fit
often with the world.
Let mild rainstorms
roll perfumed breezes
toward your nostrils.

Let tastes of food
on hungry days bless
you with enough; and
send you satisfied
to a clean bed 

in a quiet place. And
may you hear songs
that take you by the hand
and walk you softly over
sweet grass to sleep 

and warm copper dreams. 


hans ostrom 2022