Volver, volver - Harry Dean Stanton

She Hasn't Washed Her Hair Since Moab

 She hasn't washed her hair

since Moab. She's sick
of all her clothes, dull and drab.

Phoenix might change her luck--
you never know. Or it might cook
her brain with its unholy heat.

West is her dominion. Tacoma,
Oakland, Reno, Tonapah, Needles....
High mountains, mesas, plateaus.

Her rebuilt 1970s Ford--
it's her favorite friend, grumbling
like a big hungry lion.

She hasn't washed her hair
since Moab. She'll get that done
tonight in some damp motel.

Rest for a day in rough sheets,
get back on the road, and find
a job. Might be some form

of love in whatever town. You
never know. Or actually, you do.
That psychic in Sedona said so.

hans ostrom 2024

In No Time At All

(at Walnut Canyon, Arizona)

In a time designated September,

among short pine trees, and feeling
the high mountain heat, I look

across a deeply gashed canyon
and a thousand years--not time at all!--
to small homes people made

in gaps of limestone,
with sandstone rocks for
outer walls. Overhead,

crows, ravens, and hawks
whirl, riding the updrafts
of hot air. How quiet the Sanagua

generations must of have been.
I imagine murmurs and giggling,
sometimes overlain with shrieks

of illness or birthing cries. Little
traceries of smoke rising from
cook fires. People working to live.

I turn away from all the history
hiding in those crafted caves,
look down at a lichen-etched rock,

walk to the paved parking lot
to drive--in no time at all!--the roaring
machine back to Flagstaff and

its massive crops of housing.

hans ostrom 2024

The Word Woman

 for the memory of W.B.

She remained available to words
any day of time or night.  Sang
words if they wanted thrumming,
mumbled humbled ones, bathed
others in black ink.  Words
were people in her mind.  Without
them she couldn’t imagine the
something she’d be without them.
Come on, come in, she said when
they arrived.  She fixed a place
for each, knew most of their
morphological needs.  They
knew they might denote, connote,
obscure, shade, or just freely lie
around her home.
Toward words she truly
tried to act the perfect hostess.

"On Our Way, Golden One," by Roger Illsley

Where She's From

She's from Earth. From anyplace

on there where she breathes air,

eats food, drinks local water. Where

she's conversed, slept, danced,

followed customs, chafed against them,

shown respect. Where she's been helped;

and helped. She's from Earth. I think

all of us are. Maybe we should try

the habit of thinking we're from there.

Here. Because we are, and thinking so

might clear away some clutter,

smother some friction-fired heat.

She's from Earth. She likes it

here okay, when people find their

ways to get along. On Earth. 

hans ostrom 2024

Sonnet XXVII: "Naked, you are simple as one of your hands," by Pablo Neruda

Wells Fargo Employee Found Dead at Office Desk Four Days After Clocking In

My feeble hopes embarrass me:

that she died quickly with minimal pain

(define "minimal"). That she found

the tunnel of light pleasing. That

friends found her pets, if any, alive

and saw to their care. That . . . .

She clocked in but didn't clock out.

She sat alive, then dead, for four days

while electrons of her colleagues

who worked from home flitted around her. 

"There are worse ways to go," I think,

followed by "Oh, shut up." Media told

the story only because it

is click-bait. I clicked. Her name

is Denise Prudhomme.

Desafinado - Cover by Arpi Alto

Andrea Bocelli - Perfidia (Live From Portrofino / 2012)

"Ten Reasons," by Roger Illsley

Use Your Imagination

Your imagination uses you

when you use your imagination.
It's like walking a burly, leash-defying
dog. Like lecturing a cat
about excess leisure time.

Your imagination goes
where it will and then slobbers
on you. It will yawn, lick itself,
curl up, and sleep where you sleep--
and hiss if you try to move it.

hans ostrom 2024

August Fires

Smoke from Canadian fires

apricot the morning light.
Asthmatics hope for a wash
of rain or muscled breezes
off the Pacific. August

in the northern half
of our planetary melon
has ritualized fire--
images of charred houses,
cars, schools, towns,

and mountains stomp
steadily into media's flow.
I don't know, I don't know
what to to--what can I do
amdist this burning?

hans ostrom 2024