"Autumn Movement," by Carl Sandburg

 Link: Autumn Movement

Mademoiselle, Where Are Your Clothes?

Mademoiselle, 

Where are your clothes?

Should I remove mine,

Do you suppose?

You do enchant me,

My Mademoiselle.

I am inspired—

Can you tell?

Oh my dear,

Such a surprise.

I came home

And there you stood.

You stared at me

With your brown eyes.

Your nakedness

Looks very good. 

Well, here we stand,

Without a stitch. 

I do believe

We found our niche.

Oh, Mademoiselle,

Please lead the way.

I will of course do

What you say. 

Mademoiselle,

You’re so risque.

I never know

Quite what to say.

hans ostrom 2025

"Satisfied, Easily," by Roger Illsley

"Good, Good Morning," by Keith Ledbetter and Roger Illsley

"The Way," by Robert Creeley

"She Refuses to Get the Blues," by Jacquelyn Ostrom and Friends

"How Our Story Ends," by Roger Illsley and Hans Ostrom

William Blake, "Eternity"

"(Two) Haiku," by Etheridge Knight

"The Dragonfly," by Matso Basho

Awkwardly Social

To be socially

            awkward
is to be
    existentially
comic: or, bow slightly
while shaking the hand
of an American faux patrician
because their schtick,
like a witch, turns you

into a faux British-butler.
It's something to do with
mountain origins, your pop's
disdain for urbanity, your Cubist
collage of manners and inborn
suspicion that the most

well mannered people might
be serial killers, white supremacists,
that sort of beast, & your
       certainty
that fate set you down
beyond or between customary
                                  circles:
a question of placement. Ec-centric.

You're often outside,
on the pavement, nose to the glass,
staring at a Them, who
    Know What They Are Doing.

hans ostrom 2025

Brother Season, Sister Season

Autumn, nicknamed Fall

(and what a come-down),

will ride back into town

soon. Under a half-moon's

green-light cloack.

She'll sew dew

and cut last flowers,

stuff them in her saddle

bags to rot. The smell

of her horse will set

the dogs to barking.

She'll stuff berries

into the bloated bellies

of fattening bears. 

Again, she'll lose her temper,

yell, "To Hell with leaves,

I never liked them." 

Finally, her mature brother,

Winter, will stomp in wearing

white boots and an ice-cape.

"Get gone, Sister," he'll say,

direct and cold. "Come back

after next Summer. Drop a note

from South America. 

hans ostrom 2025

"Zen Ambulance," by Hans Ostrom