Birch Tree

Let's shelve the angst and see the old

birch tree, leafless, against gray sky.
Its bare sprigs that will later carry green
and gold and tiny perfect cones
hang now like brown shawls finely knit.

Its white trunk and branches, bright
white in winter light, meander, lithe
and liquid in wind, never stiff like
conifers and oaks. Close up,

black hieroglyphs write themselves
into birch-bark history. Birch tree,
often solitary, growing its own way.

hans ostrom

They Arrive for the After-Surgery Checkup

Surgical patients come down the wide white

hospital corridor, slowly, as if moving toward
a faithful space, here to receive ceremonial

check-ups. Walking or rolling, they hold
their bodies carefully like sacred jars.
They and their companions rarely talk.

The minds that live in sawed and
cut and stitched bodies
move now, live now, in devout caution.

hans ostrom 2021

Watch Stevie Wonder and Chris Stapleton Perform “Higher Ground” | 2023 G...

Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Jazz Piano - Hank Jones

Brain Surgery

A squad of technicians, dressed in blue,

arms folded, looks down at me in bed.
The anesthesiologist's potions
put me fast under before the surgeon,
Dr. Cho, gains the stage.

In my blank darkness, I don't know
he's drilling a keyhole into my skull,
then sawing a crescent-cut. Then it's
on to slicing into the brain, shoving muscles
aside, and peering in to find the Culprit:

a manatee-fat artery stalks the trigeminal
nerve from neck to jaw, lying on it
like Jabba the Hutt. The t.g. controls
eye-business, cheek business, taste
and tongue and gum business--much
show business in one facial hemisphere.

Stressed and pressed, it shoots electric-
bolt spasms into cheek or gums, deep
throbs into gums, electric flutters into
eyelashes. Before some minor palliatives
arose, the ailment drew the quaint nickname,
"the suicide disease."

In this case, the smitten artery
never gives up. Dr. Cho, pugnacious
neurosurgeon, begs to differ. He tracks
the obese entity like Kit Carson, slipping
Teflon pillows under it so that it may
lounge ineffectually, thus liberating
Mademoiselle Trigeminal Nerve.

Scheduled for 3 hours, the surgery
goes six. Awake, I'm bashed and bushed
(tell that to Cho!). Now, recovery: cautions,
gentle rainstorms of brightly colored pills,
sleeping upright (Dear Lord Give me Strength),
trying to hide from my loving, effective,
but Jesuitical wife, watching the brain
recalibrate and reboot. Suddenly I have
a Tom Waits voice and must eat in tiny
garden-party morsels. But: no pain.

I must add that a Black nurse
absently stroked my forearm
before the dance began. It was a task,
but she did it. I squeezed her fingers.
Empathy, the original medicine.

hans ostrom 2023

Crowded Mind

The mind: an airport, a stadium. From any place

or time in our lives, people push in & through,
invited maybe, mostly not: memory's
a wicked host. Ah, yes, Billy in
second grade, you were mean to him,
once, and it's haunted you since then
(if alive, Billy has forgotten you, of course).

Brown Lucina, seductive at 17, clouds
of perfume, precocious bust, she took
your arm and waltzed you to algebra class,
summoning an erection. Our

mental space: elastic, stuffed--
guilt, desire, nostalgia & the rest
howl like barkers outside clubs &
you can't say "Get out!" til it's
too late. You don't get to talk
as faces rush in, except perhaps
in some sad revisionist script:
you with your loser's bon mot.

hans ostrom 2023

Turn in Your Keys

The Ministry of Smaller Items
asks you, citizen, to turn in all
your older keys. The large ones
that used to open castles and tombs.

The saw-toothed ones that once
ruled the world of locked doors,
commercial and domestic.
The tiny ones that opened small,
shy boxes and secret handcuffs.

Such keys cannot communicate
through air or make locks chirp,
click, or tick. They cannot read
our thoughts or leave a trail
for our dear algorithms to follow.

As our Premier has said, "Old
is dangerous. New will save us!."
Yes, we are going to need you
to turn in your keys.

2023

Pretender's Odyssey

Seems like every time I tried

to pretend to be someone else,

I was just pretending to pretend.
And I wearied of the effort

fast. I then returned
to pretending to be

me. Which has been very
demanding because the task

is so ill defined & yet I'm
still dedicated to it. I act

like me & then look over
to see how I'm doing &

a me is glancing over his
shoulder, smirking, as he runs.

Sleepy

It comes on like a fog

in a sunny sea town.

It hypnotizes like the gold
watch of an old Vienna doctor.

It bargains on behalf of muscles
that work too hard too long.

It soothes you toward darkness,
promising sleep will love you.

When it goes, it leaves the door
open and slumber strides in.

hans ostrom 2023

Her Lovely Power

Spanish night.
Black hair, long. Black eyes.
My desire meets her choice.
Her power holds me in a
Balance. Night's eyes glow.

The poem is in a Spanish syllabic  form, shadorma: 3\5\3\3\7\5

Winter Chant

Winter shiver, light low.

Winter shiver, snow.
Icy days, crows hide.
The gray skies, wide.

Later Winter. Spring, come!
Pulsings like a drum.
Later Winter, longer days--
What the clock-watch says.

Latest Winter, buds swell:
Spring to ring its bell.
Watch for Winter shiver, though:
Mean frost--you never know.

Nightmare, My Visitor

At age 4, then lasting for years,
a short nightmare came to live with me.
(Sometimes it struck just as I nodded off.)

Me, in a dark oval space--
like a hollowed out eggplant.
I touched the pliant walls & then

a dark shape like a train engine
ran over me, erased me & I
startled myself awake to stay alive.

It visited less often down the years
& finally retired. Somewhere deep
in the mind's damp stone workshop,

a laborer toils to work through
something kept secret from me.
The translation of that bedeviling

dream lies in a vault down there.
I don't miss the nightmare. But if
it came back, I'd think, "Oh, it's you."

Her Lovely Power

Spanish night.

Black hair, long. Black eyes.
My desire meets her choice.
Her power holds me in a
Balance. Night's eyes glow.