A Real Mess

pink: wound, blossom, blouse, nipple, meat, cat-tongue

blue: jeans, eyes, ink, tattoo, smoke, bruise

brown: dirt, shoe, shit, hair, nipple, chair
red: blood, light, rose, lipstick, sign, ember

yellow: beach, hair, flame, rose, peach, corn
green: eyes, scarf, valley, mold, tree, broccoli

white: phantom-race, chalk, panties, smoke, paper, cream
black: eyeshade, ink, shoe shadow, hair, cavern

hurl it all, hurl it all I say at a canvas &
make a real mess: the world

hans ostrom 2022

Pollock

I saw an image of a Pollock

painting & thought well this is fun
& then thought no, not about
chaos but primal ordering
forces. Sky-blue is pretty
but red pulls eyes away from it
then black pulls red away &
I was satisfied. My gaze
made its way through undergrowth
in a wood, no one there to chop it down.

hans ostrom

She's Rising

She's rising in politics.

Filled with the yeast
of what they say It Takes.
Rising in politics,
for what purpose, she
doesn't know (though she
pretends to), except that
she likes being lifted
by the lifters, placed
by the placers.

She's rising in politics
toward higher office, well
above the People, whatever
they are. She speaks, she
greets, she gestures. Agrees
with certain persons, word-cuts
others. She's rising

with her husband and children,
who are photographed.
She became a politician,
a creature of seems, a
player of positions, dull
drama with consequences.

She falls in line, meets-with,
speaks--providing a mouth
for the ventriloquists. She flies
and of course, lies.

She rises, a balloon above
the people, who get smaller
  and smaller.

Hans Ostrom 2022

The Ornaments Convene

 A white angel, a black angel,

three black Santa Clauses. An angel
made of a toilet paper cylinder,
child's cardboard craft. Ornaments

made of beer-can aluminum,
glass ornaments from Aunt Nevada,
who loaded the mincemeat pie
with whiskey every year. A blue
sphere or two, survivors
from Christmases way-past
when Ma insisted on her blue tree
every year. A pink motorcycle,

a wooden elf who jumps
like a Cossack dancer
when you pull a string. A horse,
a cat, a crystal icicle. Red bird,
yellow bird, peacock. . . . This
is an annual reunion of ornaments,

who approve the minutes
from last year, chat while we're asleep,
stay cool with the LED lights
on an artificial tree;
who serve as metonyms
for clusters of nostalgia, loss,
and tattered joy. What about Jesus?
Well, he's there implicitly in
the eclectic hospitality.

hans ostrom 2022

"What Survives," by Rainer Maria Rilke

"The Spell," by Paul Verlaine

"Have Me," by Carl Sandburg

Bruno Mars, Morris Day and The Time - Tribute a Prince ||Performance in ...

Newborn

wrinkled from mother-water

eyes closed to the Mystery
old person's seaweed hair
fingers thin as tendrils
accepts odors, sounds, dry-
warmth. hears its own gurgling
cry. does it yet ask why?

hans ostrom 2022

*Henry Morgan Ostrom, born November 23, 2022

A Real Mess

pink: wound, blossom, blouse, nipple, meat, cat-tongue

blue: jeans, eyes, ink, tattoo, smoke, bruise

brown: dirt, shoe, shit, hair, nipple, chair
red: blood, light, rose, lipstick, sign, ember

yellow: beach, hair, flame, rose, peach, corn
green: eyes, scarf, valley, mold, tree, broccoli

white: phantom-race, chalk, panties, smoke, paper, cream
black: eyeshade, ink, shoe shadow, hair, cavern

hurl it all, hurl it all I say at a canvas &
make a real mess: the world

hans ostrom 2022

About the Photo

Yes, with my long legs and sturdy feet,

I strode into that arrythmic surf,
which tries to cover tracks.
It left two. Sharp ones, too.

Darling, you may wonder
who took the snapshot
and why in black-and-white.
And perhaps more existentially,

did I come back? From what?
I'd ask in my annoying way.
Did I turn left, did I turn right,
did I float out of sight or into jaws

of slashing sharks? This note
may confirm or deny uncertain
hypotheses. You know me,

I love to tease.

*note: the image is of a "found photo" posted on tumblr

hans ostrom 2022

Arlo Guthrie/I Can't Help Falling In Love With You

Keep It Simple

 "Be quick, but don't hurry." --John Wooden

At the clotted airport cafe, a holiday swarm:
the woman orchestrating sandwiches,
unrushed but quick, wears a hajib--

a scarf that finishes by falling
to the middle of her back. Forest green.
A light-gray top and elegant black

trousers accompany. Llke me,
she's part of this society, I'm equal
to her, except if I worked at

the sandwich station in this
bee-hive moment, I'd be fired,
a mercy. Something

about forest green, light gray,
and black: austere, soothing.
Evergreens, mist rising from a river.

hans ostrom 2022