from New Year Letter, by W.H. Auden

Oh, Of Course, Yes

Oh, of course, yes sir,
I'd very much like to pay
to watch another film
about sociopathic Americans
starring Robert De Niro or
it-doesn't-matter-who. Yes,
fascinating, humorous, ha-ha,
chuckles. No, of course,
there really aren't any
other subjects for cinema
that are quite as interesting
and exciting. Yes, sir, I am
very happy with the cinema
you provide. You are a genius!
Everyone in Hollywood is a genius!


hans ostrom 2013

Zombie Poets

They're not the Undead.
They're the Unread.

They stagger toward you
in cafes and bars,
carrying moist notebooks,
possibly wearing berets.

(Some of them were once
famous and popular. Old
anthologies muffle their
screams like thick
asylum-walls.)

They are all over
the Internet, the Unread.
("Eloise, why does he write
'they" and not 'we'?")

So much writing, so
little reading. They occupy
the night. They read poems
outside closed libraries.

They get high, the Unread,
and they behave badly in hopes
of becoming the next Bukowski.

In your nightmare,
they smother you with thousands
of saddle-stapled chapbooks
and eat from your refrigerator.
Cue ghostly music.. . . The Unread!



hans ostrom 2013

These Things Called Years

These artificial things called "years":
how annoying. They're perceptual engines
that drive us through our lives, keep us
rushed and harried, depressed and habituated.

It all starts again on "January First,"
which we're urged to celebrate. On the
Second, we must report to work on time
or get fired, and we must start

counting the god-damned shopping-days left
til the Apocalyptic Sale. (Everything must go.)


hans ostrom 2013

"The Magi," by William Butler Yeats

"Christmas Eve, Nearing Midnight, New York," by Langston Hughes

Christmas Found Poem

You should know two things before you read this. One, the language was directed at me, and, two, there is cursing.


Christmas Found Poem

I think you
are the only
one I can
think of who
would say something
like ". . . Those
fucking Christmas
macaroons."


hans ostrom 2013

Just An Acre

If counting and accounting
and statistics count, oh
so to speak, then I have
by that accounting, well,
existed. There is a record
of me. Two questions: Is
there a record of you? And,
if there is, so what?

Women's bodies are
slightly and infinitely
different from
men's bodies. This
difference has fueled
many of my nights
on Earth. If you

would argue about
differentiations
of sex, of gender,
then I applaud you.

I'm just an acre
of existence that
broke off. I'm just
a congregation of
lore, learning,
laziness.



hans ostrom 2013

"San Joaquin," by William Everson

Way Past Post-Whatever

You're no frond of mine.
When I deploy an avatar,
I am no friend of me,
and yet of course I will
be online-intimate with you.

If everything were all right
off-line, online would not
be such a place of refuge.

I am not a simple man.
For I have not evolved at least
that far.I am the make-shift product
of the what-before-me-came.
I have no name.

We're out here, there isn't
any map, and our compasses
have collapsed. This all to me
is good news. I understand
why you think otherwise.

I am no friend. I am no
fiend. That said I listen.


hans ostrom 2013

"Broken, Amazing, and Awful"

I Have Seen

I have seen the sun
and I fear the calamities.
I have seen the sun
and I seek no remedies.

I have seen the moon
and I've kissed the cool air.
I have seen the moon
in its jeweled lair.

I have seen the stars,
mostly in books, alas.
I have seen the stars:
the avant-garde of mass.


hans ostrom 2013

"Dreams," by Langston Hughes