Saturday, October 30, 2010
Thursday, October 28, 2010
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Racism Precedes "Hard Times"
This morning Tacoma News Tribune features an article about a walk of reconciliation that will commemorate the time in Tacoma's early history when Chinese immigrants were driven out. A sidebar piece asserts that "hard time" drove the white residents to uproot, abuse, and expel their Chinese neighbors.
The pieces are informative, but in my opinion, racism preceded the "hard times." We're living in comparatively hard times now, and they have certainly influenced the racism and other kinds of over-reaction, especially to President Obama and to immigration-issues. But if the pre-existing conditions of racism and xenophobia weren't already alive, many people would react differently to the hard times, and they'd be less likely to take the bait of cynical right-wing political manipulators like Karl Rove. People might be more tempted to focus, for example, on the chasm between rich and poor in the country--a chasm that isn't the fault of immigrants, or the health-care reforms, etc.
The News Tribune recently endorsed Republican incumbent Representative Dave Reichart. Reichart's offered to concrete solution to the chronic and acute health-care crisis, and he has sat quietly as his party slides further right and as it exploits fear and racism. Reichart was also sitting next to Rep. Joe Wilson when Wilson shouted, "You lie!" during President Obama's State of the Union message. Wilson wouldn't have shouted that if he hadn't had a pre-existing arrogant and resentful attitude toward the President and if, deep down, he felt licensed to shout because Obama is Black. Reichart sat and accepted his colleague's behavior.
Yes, times are tough, and stressed people over-react. But, regardless of their politics, more media need to speak out against the hatred, race-baiting, and fear-mongering. The Democrats are no day at the beach, and all politicians play on emotions, but it's the Republican Party--once it was Eisenhower's Party, if you can believe that--that's become a repository of hate, racism, and despotism. The News Tribune and other media can do something now, or at least say something now, about vicious pre-existing conditions similar to those that drove people to drive out the Chinese. Moderate Republicans also need to break ranks and speak out against Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and Karl Rove; after all, Rove wasn't the least bit reticent to savage a fellow Republican, John McCain, when McCain was running against Bush. And the tactic was the same: exploit fear and hatred.
What would Edward R. Murrow say and do? And did any reasonable people think that Murrow student up to McCarthy because of Party politics? I doubt it. They understood Murrow was standing up to McCarthy because of what McCarthy was doing, how he was exploiting fear and hatred, and where he was taking government and politics.
The pieces are informative, but in my opinion, racism preceded the "hard times." We're living in comparatively hard times now, and they have certainly influenced the racism and other kinds of over-reaction, especially to President Obama and to immigration-issues. But if the pre-existing conditions of racism and xenophobia weren't already alive, many people would react differently to the hard times, and they'd be less likely to take the bait of cynical right-wing political manipulators like Karl Rove. People might be more tempted to focus, for example, on the chasm between rich and poor in the country--a chasm that isn't the fault of immigrants, or the health-care reforms, etc.
The News Tribune recently endorsed Republican incumbent Representative Dave Reichart. Reichart's offered to concrete solution to the chronic and acute health-care crisis, and he has sat quietly as his party slides further right and as it exploits fear and racism. Reichart was also sitting next to Rep. Joe Wilson when Wilson shouted, "You lie!" during President Obama's State of the Union message. Wilson wouldn't have shouted that if he hadn't had a pre-existing arrogant and resentful attitude toward the President and if, deep down, he felt licensed to shout because Obama is Black. Reichart sat and accepted his colleague's behavior.
Yes, times are tough, and stressed people over-react. But, regardless of their politics, more media need to speak out against the hatred, race-baiting, and fear-mongering. The Democrats are no day at the beach, and all politicians play on emotions, but it's the Republican Party--once it was Eisenhower's Party, if you can believe that--that's become a repository of hate, racism, and despotism. The News Tribune and other media can do something now, or at least say something now, about vicious pre-existing conditions similar to those that drove people to drive out the Chinese. Moderate Republicans also need to break ranks and speak out against Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and Karl Rove; after all, Rove wasn't the least bit reticent to savage a fellow Republican, John McCain, when McCain was running against Bush. And the tactic was the same: exploit fear and hatred.
What would Edward R. Murrow say and do? And did any reasonable people think that Murrow student up to McCarthy because of Party politics? I doubt it. They understood Murrow was standing up to McCarthy because of what McCarthy was doing, how he was exploiting fear and hatred, and where he was taking government and politics.
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Monday, October 25, 2010
Everybody Fails
*
*
*
*
*
*
Everybody Fails
Everybody fails, no exceptions. Some
get the hang of it earlier than others.
Some get trapped in it soon by
implacable circumstances. Many
arrive late at understanding failure.
Delusion drops these off at the curb.
And then there are those who get
a lot of help along the way from
people who envy and hate, who
are desperate for others to fail.
Rarer are people who help people
to succeed before, inevitably,
they fail. These helpers are otherwise
known as good people. They fail, too.
But not before they succeed
at being good.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
*
*
*
*
*
Everybody Fails
Everybody fails, no exceptions. Some
get the hang of it earlier than others.
Some get trapped in it soon by
implacable circumstances. Many
arrive late at understanding failure.
Delusion drops these off at the curb.
And then there are those who get
a lot of help along the way from
people who envy and hate, who
are desperate for others to fail.
Rarer are people who help people
to succeed before, inevitably,
they fail. These helpers are otherwise
known as good people. They fail, too.
But not before they succeed
at being good.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
Saturday, October 23, 2010
Friday, October 22, 2010
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
Monday, October 18, 2010
Topics StumbleUpon Should Include
I've just started virtual "stumbling," although in real life I've been stumbling (and bumbling!) for quite some time.
StumbleUpon is another "social medium," in case you don't know. You can get a "blog" there, but usually the "blogs" consist of posted links to videos or sites. You can follow other "stumblers" and also make "friends." All of these words are in quotation marks because their meaning changes in Cyberspace.
To stumble in this context is to let whatever computer/server is in charge take you in any direction. So let's say you visit a site on gardening and then hit "stumble": it could take you to an interview with Charles Manson.
When you post or re-post something--let's say from Youtube--you will get either the prompt "Like It," and then the item becomes one of your "favorites, or a prompt that invites you to provide more information. When the latter prompt comes up, you are invited to choose topics related to the post; you choose from a pre-existing list, one that I think needs some crucial additions. To be fair, you may also add "tags," in which case you may provide your own terms and not use just StumbleUpon's.
At any rate, here are some topics that are missing from StumbleUpon's pre-set list of topics and that I think deserve to be there (no particular order):
Love
Media [and their problems/issues, including ownership--implicitly; and how odd that StumbleUpon wouldn't include this topic]
Racism
Poverty
Hunger
Fact-Check
Philanthropy [other related topics are charity and non-profit or not-for-profit--that sector of the economy]
Fascism [it includes anarchism, socialism, and capitalism already]
Nuclear Proliferation [it includes "Nuclear Science" already)
Class-Status [or Social Class]
Peace
War
Civil Rights [it includes Disabilities already--but nothing, for example, about Disability Rights]
Asian Americans [it includes already, as it should, African Americans]
Latino or Hispanic Americans (or another--perhaps more appropriate--term; see above regarding Asian Americans)
Interestingly, it includes "Latin Music" already but not one on Latino-Americans or Hispanic Americans
Okay, that's all for now.
StumbleUpon is another "social medium," in case you don't know. You can get a "blog" there, but usually the "blogs" consist of posted links to videos or sites. You can follow other "stumblers" and also make "friends." All of these words are in quotation marks because their meaning changes in Cyberspace.
To stumble in this context is to let whatever computer/server is in charge take you in any direction. So let's say you visit a site on gardening and then hit "stumble": it could take you to an interview with Charles Manson.
When you post or re-post something--let's say from Youtube--you will get either the prompt "Like It," and then the item becomes one of your "favorites, or a prompt that invites you to provide more information. When the latter prompt comes up, you are invited to choose topics related to the post; you choose from a pre-existing list, one that I think needs some crucial additions. To be fair, you may also add "tags," in which case you may provide your own terms and not use just StumbleUpon's.
At any rate, here are some topics that are missing from StumbleUpon's pre-set list of topics and that I think deserve to be there (no particular order):
Love
Media [and their problems/issues, including ownership--implicitly; and how odd that StumbleUpon wouldn't include this topic]
Racism
Poverty
Hunger
Fact-Check
Philanthropy [other related topics are charity and non-profit or not-for-profit--that sector of the economy]
Fascism [it includes anarchism, socialism, and capitalism already]
Nuclear Proliferation [it includes "Nuclear Science" already)
Class-Status [or Social Class]
Peace
War
Civil Rights [it includes Disabilities already--but nothing, for example, about Disability Rights]
Asian Americans [it includes already, as it should, African Americans]
Latino or Hispanic Americans (or another--perhaps more appropriate--term; see above regarding Asian Americans)
Interestingly, it includes "Latin Music" already but not one on Latino-Americans or Hispanic Americans
Okay, that's all for now.
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Top Rated Video So Far
In case anyone asks, my top-rated poetry-video on Youtube is...
"Morphine"
I've been making "videos," really slide-shows, that accompany my reading of poems, mostly poems by famous writers, a few by be. "Morphine" happens to be one of mine. The most viewed video by far is "Giantess," by Charles Baudelaire, translated by Fowlie. Reality forces me to admit, however, that the gold-standard Youtube recording is by "Tom O'Bedlam" at the Spoken Verse channel--link at right.
I've been recording for about three months, and I am just now getting the hang of it. A new microphone and lots of practice helped. I'm using an AT2020 USB.
"Morphine"
I've been making "videos," really slide-shows, that accompany my reading of poems, mostly poems by famous writers, a few by be. "Morphine" happens to be one of mine. The most viewed video by far is "Giantess," by Charles Baudelaire, translated by Fowlie. Reality forces me to admit, however, that the gold-standard Youtube recording is by "Tom O'Bedlam" at the Spoken Verse channel--link at right.
I've been recording for about three months, and I am just now getting the hang of it. A new microphone and lots of practice helped. I'm using an AT2020 USB.
Saturday, October 16, 2010
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Monday, October 11, 2010
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Saturday, October 9, 2010
Friday, October 8, 2010
Thursday, October 7, 2010
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Cold Poet
*
**
***
****
Cold Poet
Her poems featured
no people, and people
awarded her poetry
the Noblitzer Prize.
There was a photo
of her face, thin
and wan like a wax
candle, against
a backdrop of
a blackberry patch,
representing nature,
which her poems featured.
They featured her in nature.
In later years, she had
dried up like a golden raisin.
After she died, they laid
her in a tiny jeweler's box
for burial. They put a few
of her poems in anthologies
with titles like Vault,
Tomb, and Sarcophagus.
The people she'd left out
of her poems lived their
lives as if her poems
didn't exist. If you've
gone outside on a sunny
morning and been shocked
momentarily by how cold
the wind is, then you know
what it's like to read
one of her poems.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
**
***
****
Cold Poet
Her poems featured
no people, and people
awarded her poetry
the Noblitzer Prize.
There was a photo
of her face, thin
and wan like a wax
candle, against
a backdrop of
a blackberry patch,
representing nature,
which her poems featured.
They featured her in nature.
In later years, she had
dried up like a golden raisin.
After she died, they laid
her in a tiny jeweler's box
for burial. They put a few
of her poems in anthologies
with titles like Vault,
Tomb, and Sarcophagus.
The people she'd left out
of her poems lived their
lives as if her poems
didn't exist. If you've
gone outside on a sunny
morning and been shocked
momentarily by how cold
the wind is, then you know
what it's like to read
one of her poems.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Incidentally
*
**
***
****
Incidentally
Incidentally, has a large gray
grasshopper launched, flown
jaggedly, and flopped in front
of you on sunlit blond grass?
When it was aloft, did it look
like it wore a black garment
underneath its wings? Did you
enjoy the nearly comic, very short,
and hazarded hop? Ah, excellent.
I am happy to hear so.
Copyright 2010
**
***
****
Incidentally
Incidentally, has a large gray
grasshopper launched, flown
jaggedly, and flopped in front
of you on sunlit blond grass?
When it was aloft, did it look
like it wore a black garment
underneath its wings? Did you
enjoy the nearly comic, very short,
and hazarded hop? Ah, excellent.
I am happy to hear so.
Copyright 2010
Monday, September 27, 2010
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Polonius and Hamlet
*
*
**
***
****
Polonius and Hamlet
Polonius survives. Hamlet's still
the annoying star, dithering his way
to a fifth act, finally taking action
when everyone else is either dead
or exhausted. For heaven's sake,
he talks to a skull!
Polonius means well and thus
is despised. He does wormy things
to adapt, can't choose the best
advice and so gives it all like
most dads, gets stabbed through
a curtain while trying for advancement
in the company.
Hamlets are indulged, petted,
and finally enshrined. They fret
out loud and grab attention--
you know the type. They can
make you forget they're royalty.
Polonius persists in millions if not
billions--necessary but mocked, not
of the inner circle, perched on
the circumference of power, shafted
by the radius. Oh, well: they both
end up dead in the play and living
in Yorickville, borrowing for a
mortgage, lending advice and
forcing soliloquies on their friends,
stabber and stabbee. Nobody wants
to spend a lot of time with either
one of these guys. They're a lot of
work, these two, Hamlet and Polonius.
Copyright 2010
*
**
***
****
Polonius and Hamlet
Polonius survives. Hamlet's still
the annoying star, dithering his way
to a fifth act, finally taking action
when everyone else is either dead
or exhausted. For heaven's sake,
he talks to a skull!
Polonius means well and thus
is despised. He does wormy things
to adapt, can't choose the best
advice and so gives it all like
most dads, gets stabbed through
a curtain while trying for advancement
in the company.
Hamlets are indulged, petted,
and finally enshrined. They fret
out loud and grab attention--
you know the type. They can
make you forget they're royalty.
Polonius persists in millions if not
billions--necessary but mocked, not
of the inner circle, perched on
the circumference of power, shafted
by the radius. Oh, well: they both
end up dead in the play and living
in Yorickville, borrowing for a
mortgage, lending advice and
forcing soliloquies on their friends,
stabber and stabbee. Nobody wants
to spend a lot of time with either
one of these guys. They're a lot of
work, these two, Hamlet and Polonius.
Copyright 2010
The 3:30 a.m. Non-Blues
*
**
***
****
The 3:30 a.m. Non-Blues
When you wake up
at 3:30 a.m., you wish you
had the blues because
then you could be
conventionally sad.
When you wake up
that early in the morning
it's not
really morning but
it's not really bad.
It's way past midnight
but way before dawn.
If you say anything at all
to no one, you say it
with a yawn.
You don't have the blues,
and it turns out you can be satisfied.
You don't have the blues,
and by golly, you can be satisfied.
If you were to say you had the blues,
well, you would have just lied.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
**
***
****
The 3:30 a.m. Non-Blues
When you wake up
at 3:30 a.m., you wish you
had the blues because
then you could be
conventionally sad.
When you wake up
that early in the morning
it's not
really morning but
it's not really bad.
It's way past midnight
but way before dawn.
If you say anything at all
to no one, you say it
with a yawn.
You don't have the blues,
and it turns out you can be satisfied.
You don't have the blues,
and by golly, you can be satisfied.
If you were to say you had the blues,
well, you would have just lied.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
Friday, September 24, 2010
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
The Great American Poet Lottery
*
*
*
The Great American Poet Lottery
Everybody--okay, about 12 people--
is upset about the state of American poetry.
There was even something about it
on the Puffington Host. What a thing
to get upset about!
None of the upsettees has read a fraction
of what's being written, so they can't really
know the state of American poetry. No one
can read more than a fraction. Spooky, I know.
They're just upset about the poetry they
have read, I guess, and they're entitled.
But they may have missed (wait for it)
the Paradigm Shift. Poetry everywhere lives
in the electronic clouds now, its relationship
to nations and literary management tenuous.
It also refuses to stop propagating, and
that bugs the shit out of some people. Less
is more. Economy of false scarcity.
The upsettees miss the old days. (Randall
Jarrell once wrote that in the Golden Age,
people probably went around complaining
about how yellow everything was.) I don't
agree with the upsettees, but I sympathize.
I'm a sympathizer. They miss those certain days
when anthologies and certain critics and
certain presses told us all who was great.
Anyway, I have a solution. The Great American
Poet Lottery. You enter it by sending in
a poem of yours, see. Drawings held--what?--
weekly? If your poem's picked, you become
a Great American Poet, lounging with Walt,
snoring with Tse Tse, giggling at Emily's
wicked jokes, laughing with Langston.
Okay, sure, a small cash-prize, paid in
Swedish kronor, don't ask me why. If you
become a Great American Poet, you get to
show up drunk and late to every reading
you give and have people still love you.
You're automatically in the running
to become Poet Lariat. (I kind of like
that joke.) You win, and the ones worried
about the state of American poetry win
because they'll have one more reason
to worry about the state of American poetry.
American poetry wins by retaining its
sense of absurdity, its crassness,
and its careening barbaric yawp. And nobody
gets hurt--something that is worth worrying about.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
*
*
The Great American Poet Lottery
Everybody--okay, about 12 people--
is upset about the state of American poetry.
There was even something about it
on the Puffington Host. What a thing
to get upset about!
None of the upsettees has read a fraction
of what's being written, so they can't really
know the state of American poetry. No one
can read more than a fraction. Spooky, I know.
They're just upset about the poetry they
have read, I guess, and they're entitled.
But they may have missed (wait for it)
the Paradigm Shift. Poetry everywhere lives
in the electronic clouds now, its relationship
to nations and literary management tenuous.
It also refuses to stop propagating, and
that bugs the shit out of some people. Less
is more. Economy of false scarcity.
The upsettees miss the old days. (Randall
Jarrell once wrote that in the Golden Age,
people probably went around complaining
about how yellow everything was.) I don't
agree with the upsettees, but I sympathize.
I'm a sympathizer. They miss those certain days
when anthologies and certain critics and
certain presses told us all who was great.
Anyway, I have a solution. The Great American
Poet Lottery. You enter it by sending in
a poem of yours, see. Drawings held--what?--
weekly? If your poem's picked, you become
a Great American Poet, lounging with Walt,
snoring with Tse Tse, giggling at Emily's
wicked jokes, laughing with Langston.
Okay, sure, a small cash-prize, paid in
Swedish kronor, don't ask me why. If you
become a Great American Poet, you get to
show up drunk and late to every reading
you give and have people still love you.
You're automatically in the running
to become Poet Lariat. (I kind of like
that joke.) You win, and the ones worried
about the state of American poetry win
because they'll have one more reason
to worry about the state of American poetry.
American poetry wins by retaining its
sense of absurdity, its crassness,
and its careening barbaric yawp. And nobody
gets hurt--something that is worth worrying about.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
The Work of the Writer
*
*
*
*
The Work of the Writer
I'm a writer.
My job's to fill up notebooks.
I usually work the swing-shift.
The words are kept
in wheeled bins, which I roll
over to my station.
I unload the bins,
put the words on the conveyor
belt, which then rides the words
into the notebooks. On my breaks,
I go outside, nibble sandwich
corners, smoke cigarettes,
bullshit with the other writers
at the plant.
The shift-manager comes to fetch us,
the rat-bastard. --Back to work
until the horn goes off.
After that, we hit the taverns,
sit with vacant visages ("visages":
I saw that word on the belt today).
We try not to speak unless we have to:
You know how it is--you want to forget
work. A carpenter doesn't go to a tavern
looking to build anything. Once
I was walking home, and I saw the Muse.
She owns the plant. She's absolutely
gorgeous. I asked her for a kiss.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
*
*
*
The Work of the Writer
I'm a writer.
My job's to fill up notebooks.
I usually work the swing-shift.
The words are kept
in wheeled bins, which I roll
over to my station.
I unload the bins,
put the words on the conveyor
belt, which then rides the words
into the notebooks. On my breaks,
I go outside, nibble sandwich
corners, smoke cigarettes,
bullshit with the other writers
at the plant.
The shift-manager comes to fetch us,
the rat-bastard. --Back to work
until the horn goes off.
After that, we hit the taverns,
sit with vacant visages ("visages":
I saw that word on the belt today).
We try not to speak unless we have to:
You know how it is--you want to forget
work. A carpenter doesn't go to a tavern
looking to build anything. Once
I was walking home, and I saw the Muse.
She owns the plant. She's absolutely
gorgeous. I asked her for a kiss.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
Monday, September 20, 2010
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Saturday, September 18, 2010
Show That Man Some Respect
*
*
*
*
*
Show That Man Some Respect
for C.M. in N.C
You need to show that man some respect.
Otherwise, you can expect some
resistance. For instance, listen
well before you disagree, for if you
do, you may well see he's right,
as he's been known to be.
He's very smart and very wise:
there is a difference. Look
at his eyes. Read what he's written.
He keeps things in, and he may not
tell you you've been rude.
So I thought I'd let you know--
for your sake, mine, and his, that is.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
*
*
*
*
Show That Man Some Respect
for C.M. in N.C
You need to show that man some respect.
Otherwise, you can expect some
resistance. For instance, listen
well before you disagree, for if you
do, you may well see he's right,
as he's been known to be.
He's very smart and very wise:
there is a difference. Look
at his eyes. Read what he's written.
He keeps things in, and he may not
tell you you've been rude.
So I thought I'd let you know--
for your sake, mine, and his, that is.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
New Dance Craze
*
*
*
*
*
Do the Paradigm Shift!
You put your hands in the air.
You put both feet out. You
fall through space, and
you try to shout--
oh, yeah--can you feel the lift?
Now you're doing the Paradigm Shift!
Oh yeah, do the Paradigm Shift.
Uh-huh, do the Paradigm Shift.
It's the latest craze, and it's
a dubious gift!
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
*
*
*
*
Do the Paradigm Shift!
You put your hands in the air.
You put both feet out. You
fall through space, and
you try to shout--
oh, yeah--can you feel the lift?
Now you're doing the Paradigm Shift!
Oh yeah, do the Paradigm Shift.
Uh-huh, do the Paradigm Shift.
It's the latest craze, and it's
a dubious gift!
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
Menu
*
*
*
*
Menu
The special today is sunshine soup
topped with a dollop of cloud. It
is accompanied in a minor key
by roasted regrets in a reduction
sauce. A choir of angels may visit
your table, coming after you,
coming for to carry you home.
A gratuity is expected after their song.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
*
*
*
Menu
The special today is sunshine soup
topped with a dollop of cloud. It
is accompanied in a minor key
by roasted regrets in a reduction
sauce. A choir of angels may visit
your table, coming after you,
coming for to carry you home.
A gratuity is expected after their song.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
We're The Ghosts
*
*
*
*
We're the Ghosts
We're the ghosts,
who seem to ourselves
and each other to be alive,
substantial, here, important.
Look closely. Wherever you are
now, imagine how quickly every
body there will vanish, be
in effect replaced, how fast
the place itself will alter,
how other people feeling real
will inhabit the space and not
know they don't know a thing
about you and me and us.
And not know how soon they'll go,
ghosts.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
*
*
*
We're the Ghosts
We're the ghosts,
who seem to ourselves
and each other to be alive,
substantial, here, important.
Look closely. Wherever you are
now, imagine how quickly every
body there will vanish, be
in effect replaced, how fast
the place itself will alter,
how other people feeling real
will inhabit the space and not
know they don't know a thing
about you and me and us.
And not know how soon they'll go,
ghosts.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
Freight Train
*
*
*
*
*
Freight Train
They say a freight train lets out that blast
to warn those near the tracks to get away
as it rolls heavy through a city.
I say it's a beckoning to hobos in our souls
who tell us we have done about all we're
going to do--not much and not what
anybody wanted anyhow. So why not go,
why not grab steel, ride the freighting
beast down the coast to the last boast
you'll ever make before you shake
oblivion's hand and go back to being
particles commonly found in the universe?
A train's wail is a tune from that
incalcuable space. A train's machine-cry
makes you want to chase the train,
a chain of iron cars, a creature born
of burned out stars. Your life says,
"That train is just blind freight--
stay here, under covers, go to sleep."
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
*
*
*
*
Freight Train
They say a freight train lets out that blast
to warn those near the tracks to get away
as it rolls heavy through a city.
I say it's a beckoning to hobos in our souls
who tell us we have done about all we're
going to do--not much and not what
anybody wanted anyhow. So why not go,
why not grab steel, ride the freighting
beast down the coast to the last boast
you'll ever make before you shake
oblivion's hand and go back to being
particles commonly found in the universe?
A train's wail is a tune from that
incalcuable space. A train's machine-cry
makes you want to chase the train,
a chain of iron cars, a creature born
of burned out stars. Your life says,
"That train is just blind freight--
stay here, under covers, go to sleep."
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
A Lovely Woman's Nose
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ling to portrait
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A Lovely Woman's Nose
There are many things to say
about a lovely woman's nose,
which always points in the correct
direction and holds its place
amongst the beauty of the face.
We shall not say these many things
today but shall hold them in our
minds just beyond these words--
covert but close by. They will be
like the shapes, angles, and shades
that serve as defining context of
the lovely woman's nose--yes,
the lovely woman's nose: consider it.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
*
ling to portrait
*
*
*
A Lovely Woman's Nose
There are many things to say
about a lovely woman's nose,
which always points in the correct
direction and holds its place
amongst the beauty of the face.
We shall not say these many things
today but shall hold them in our
minds just beyond these words--
covert but close by. They will be
like the shapes, angles, and shades
that serve as defining context of
the lovely woman's nose--yes,
the lovely woman's nose: consider it.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
Tom O'Bedlam on Intelligence
Here are some interesting words on the topic of intelligence, and on related topics, from Tom O'Bedlam, who operates the marvelous Spoken Verse channel on Youtube--a link to which you'll see just to the right:
"There's no real advantage in intelligence to a man trying to make a conventional living. Like Isaac Newton, I had to invent a use for it. Literature is one possible use and it satisfied me until I found electronics which proved far more profitable.
When I'm asked what intelligence is I sometimes say "The likelihood of being right" and leave it at that if I want to be annoying. Otherwise I soften it by adding, "if there are no other factors involved, such as learning, experience, altruism and discernment". It's obvious that IQ tests measure the ability to give the correct responses to self-contained questions that have only one answer. The problem for the intelligent man is that he can often find reasons why they're not self-contained and have no single clear answer.
Sometimes I say something like "It's the ability to form internal Mental Models of the real world which can be interrogated for predictions, inferences and conclusions which, in turn, can be observed, measured and verified in the real world". In fact it's the ability to do a few parlour tricks that, when demonstrated, leave people no more impressed or envious than they would be by any other kind of incomprehensible magic.
Richard Feynman said something like "There are some people who are unteachable, who accept nothing on authority, who take in no piece of information unless they have verified it by conscious analysis, who tediously construct their own world from raw data and concepts - and it is on these people science depends" That's a wild paraphrase. I like Bernard Shaw's syllogism from The Revolutionist's Handbook "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable man attempts to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on unreasonable men".
It takes a long while for technical innovation to make its changes to the world. We're still suffering from the effects of the industrial revolution, particularly on the effect of digging up and reintroducing to the environment all the elements, heavy metals and hydrocarbons, that bacteria and other early lifeforms spend a bilion years burying before human life was even possible. The effect of reintroducing these elements into the environment may, within a century or two, make human life impossible.
We're still adapying to the effect of eating starch, which wasn't possible until the technical innovation of cooking, and the major effects such as obesity and diabetes are still a scourge. However the other side effects, such as increased perception and relief from the perpetual need for hunting and gathering, made civilisation possible.
How the hive-mind made possible by free worldwide information sharing will affect humanity as a whole is harder to predict. Religion won't submit without a struggle to the death: it has more emotion to drive it than rational atheism. Even Dawkins and Hitchens are h=just as fervent in their belief in atheism - it seems that the propensity for fervent belief is an inherited trait, like the ability to learn a language. I'd go for selling the opposite of Pascal's Wager - that one should live as though there were no recompense in heaven - to stop peple from sacrificing their one-and-only lives.
Perhaps intelligence is coming into its own at last and, as you say, will supercede professionalism. Society has been dominated by professionals who educate their children to become professionals in their place thus maintaining the status quo and opposing change and progress. Another Bernard Shaw quote - "All professions are a conspiracy against the layman".
"There's no real advantage in intelligence to a man trying to make a conventional living. Like Isaac Newton, I had to invent a use for it. Literature is one possible use and it satisfied me until I found electronics which proved far more profitable.
When I'm asked what intelligence is I sometimes say "The likelihood of being right" and leave it at that if I want to be annoying. Otherwise I soften it by adding, "if there are no other factors involved, such as learning, experience, altruism and discernment". It's obvious that IQ tests measure the ability to give the correct responses to self-contained questions that have only one answer. The problem for the intelligent man is that he can often find reasons why they're not self-contained and have no single clear answer.
Sometimes I say something like "It's the ability to form internal Mental Models of the real world which can be interrogated for predictions, inferences and conclusions which, in turn, can be observed, measured and verified in the real world". In fact it's the ability to do a few parlour tricks that, when demonstrated, leave people no more impressed or envious than they would be by any other kind of incomprehensible magic.
Richard Feynman said something like "There are some people who are unteachable, who accept nothing on authority, who take in no piece of information unless they have verified it by conscious analysis, who tediously construct their own world from raw data and concepts - and it is on these people science depends" That's a wild paraphrase. I like Bernard Shaw's syllogism from The Revolutionist's Handbook "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable man attempts to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on unreasonable men".
It takes a long while for technical innovation to make its changes to the world. We're still suffering from the effects of the industrial revolution, particularly on the effect of digging up and reintroducing to the environment all the elements, heavy metals and hydrocarbons, that bacteria and other early lifeforms spend a bilion years burying before human life was even possible. The effect of reintroducing these elements into the environment may, within a century or two, make human life impossible.
We're still adapying to the effect of eating starch, which wasn't possible until the technical innovation of cooking, and the major effects such as obesity and diabetes are still a scourge. However the other side effects, such as increased perception and relief from the perpetual need for hunting and gathering, made civilisation possible.
How the hive-mind made possible by free worldwide information sharing will affect humanity as a whole is harder to predict. Religion won't submit without a struggle to the death: it has more emotion to drive it than rational atheism. Even Dawkins and Hitchens are h=just as fervent in their belief in atheism - it seems that the propensity for fervent belief is an inherited trait, like the ability to learn a language. I'd go for selling the opposite of Pascal's Wager - that one should live as though there were no recompense in heaven - to stop peple from sacrificing their one-and-only lives.
Perhaps intelligence is coming into its own at last and, as you say, will supercede professionalism. Society has been dominated by professionals who educate their children to become professionals in their place thus maintaining the status quo and opposing change and progress. Another Bernard Shaw quote - "All professions are a conspiracy against the layman".
Friday, September 17, 2010
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
Do We Know?
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Do We Know?
Do we know?
Sure we do.
Then we go
and change our
minds--meaning
our minds refuse
to know what
they once knew,
or pretended to.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
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*
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Do We Know?
Do we know?
Sure we do.
Then we go
and change our
minds--meaning
our minds refuse
to know what
they once knew,
or pretended to.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
A Classic
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A Classic
I was sitting in a dentist's chair
today, thinking that until everybody
on the planet can get their teeth
cleaned and fixed routinely--
everybody--then civilization's a
failure. Sure, fine, build bombs,
preach holy words, teach Plato,
paint canvases, create symphonies,
pour money into The Endowment, and
write long novels--snore, snore, snore.
All of this and more
doesn't square accounts, and,
goddamnit, you know it. Fix
everybody's teeth, after you
have fed and sheltered them.
These things are the classics
of civilization, to be shared by,
to accessible to, all.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
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A Classic
I was sitting in a dentist's chair
today, thinking that until everybody
on the planet can get their teeth
cleaned and fixed routinely--
everybody--then civilization's a
failure. Sure, fine, build bombs,
preach holy words, teach Plato,
paint canvases, create symphonies,
pour money into The Endowment, and
write long novels--snore, snore, snore.
All of this and more
doesn't square accounts, and,
goddamnit, you know it. Fix
everybody's teeth, after you
have fed and sheltered them.
These things are the classics
of civilization, to be shared by,
to accessible to, all.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
As If
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As If
As if the buzzing, built-up hive
called the world were a fabricated
facade someone could unfasten and lift
to expose operational guts (the real
engineering), dreams sometimes seem
so right that in the midst of them,
you think, "Yes, it's a dream, and
I'm sleeping, but this is how things
are as they are," and the dream, a
low-budget movie of the highest
quality, has just shown you a thing
or two about how to interpret
a thing or two, but the dream itself
requires no interpretation, any more
than a sharpening stone needs sharpening.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
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*
*
*
*
As If
As if the buzzing, built-up hive
called the world were a fabricated
facade someone could unfasten and lift
to expose operational guts (the real
engineering), dreams sometimes seem
so right that in the midst of them,
you think, "Yes, it's a dream, and
I'm sleeping, but this is how things
are as they are," and the dream, a
low-budget movie of the highest
quality, has just shown you a thing
or two about how to interpret
a thing or two, but the dream itself
requires no interpretation, any more
than a sharpening stone needs sharpening.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
Gray Weaver
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Gray Weaver
The gray weaver dated
the grim reaper for a while.
She liked the fabric
of his hooded cloak,
instructed him not
to bring the scythe
with him when they dined
out. The reaper admitted,
"All of this, this life-activity,
bores me. I love death." She
wove him a pale gray cloak. It
softened his image. He looked like
a cloud that held a harvest tool,
nothing to worry about--honest!
But he said he couldn't accept
the gift. They stopped seeing
one another. That was many
a reaping, many a gray rug ago.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
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*
*
*
*
Gray Weaver
The gray weaver dated
the grim reaper for a while.
She liked the fabric
of his hooded cloak,
instructed him not
to bring the scythe
with him when they dined
out. The reaper admitted,
"All of this, this life-activity,
bores me. I love death." She
wove him a pale gray cloak. It
softened his image. He looked like
a cloud that held a harvest tool,
nothing to worry about--honest!
But he said he couldn't accept
the gift. They stopped seeing
one another. That was many
a reaping, many a gray rug ago.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
I'm Glad I Never
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I'm Glad I Never . . .
...Built missiles.
Ate whale meat.
Purchased a boat of any kind.
Went to law school (LSAT score: 666).
Shot myself with a nail-gun.
Killed a bear.
Played polo.
Became a dictator.
Climbed Mt. Everest.
Believed Plato.
Joined the Mob.
Skated naked.
Mined coal.
Dodged the draft.
Got drafted (draft number: 007, not kidding).
Mined coal.
Owned a coal mine.
Drank anti-freeze.
Started a riot.
Called anyone the N-word.
Joined the Navy.
Believed Reagan.
Lied about where I was from.
Shot heroin.
Became a pornographer.
Caved in.
Went to Idaho that one time.
Went to Berkeley that one time.
Copyright 2010
*
*
*
*
*
I'm Glad I Never . . .
...Built missiles.
Ate whale meat.
Purchased a boat of any kind.
Went to law school (LSAT score: 666).
Shot myself with a nail-gun.
Killed a bear.
Played polo.
Became a dictator.
Climbed Mt. Everest.
Believed Plato.
Joined the Mob.
Skated naked.
Mined coal.
Dodged the draft.
Got drafted (draft number: 007, not kidding).
Mined coal.
Owned a coal mine.
Drank anti-freeze.
Started a riot.
Called anyone the N-word.
Joined the Navy.
Believed Reagan.
Lied about where I was from.
Shot heroin.
Became a pornographer.
Caved in.
Went to Idaho that one time.
Went to Berkeley that one time.
Copyright 2010
Places We've Gone
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Places We've Gone After We've Made Love
Nowhere.
Stockholm.
The movies.
Ephesus.
A restaurant.
A cafe.
A bar.
The city dump.
A supermarket.
Outside.
To sleep.
Inside.
The Post Office.
Florence.
Sacramento.
A beach.
A kitchen.
Mobile.
A bathroom.
A museum.
A roof.
A swimming pool.
An ocean.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
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*
*
*
*
*
Places We've Gone After We've Made Love
Nowhere.
Stockholm.
The movies.
Ephesus.
A restaurant.
A cafe.
A bar.
The city dump.
A supermarket.
Outside.
To sleep.
Inside.
The Post Office.
Florence.
Sacramento.
A beach.
A kitchen.
Mobile.
A bathroom.
A museum.
A roof.
A swimming pool.
An ocean.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
Lombardy Poplar
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Lombardy Poplar
In a light breeze, the ease
with which branchings and leaves
of a single Lombardy poplar move,
each in a different direction
and way, and how the tree becomes
an infinitely syncopated whole that
later and clumsily we'll call tremble,
naturally defy math and digital
imitation because they won't hold still
for a binary moment or repeat itself,
so poplar fascinates beyond words but also
coaxes words, and there it is, the poplar,
the one poplar, the one, and there it goes,
and now a crow caws. Twice.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
*
*
*
*
*
*
Lombardy Poplar
In a light breeze, the ease
with which branchings and leaves
of a single Lombardy poplar move,
each in a different direction
and way, and how the tree becomes
an infinitely syncopated whole that
later and clumsily we'll call tremble,
naturally defy math and digital
imitation because they won't hold still
for a binary moment or repeat itself,
so poplar fascinates beyond words but also
coaxes words, and there it is, the poplar,
the one poplar, the one, and there it goes,
and now a crow caws. Twice.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
So Much For Experience
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So Much For Experience
Is experience too expensive?
In those days, I knew so little,
and now I know even less.
I feel like a door-to-door
salesman who sells doors,
knocking on locked examples
of what I try to sell.
Life's an elaborate experiment
with no hypothesis and with a
volatile concoction of methods.
Once you get the results, you
move on to Heaven, I gather,
and make your report--angels
roaring with laughter:
apparently this stuff never
gets old. . . .
I passed two women on the street.
The one smoking a cigarette was
saying to the other, "Well, if
it's one thing I've learned from
experience, it's . . .". I'd
walked too far past to hear the rest.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
*
*
*
*
*
So Much For Experience
Is experience too expensive?
In those days, I knew so little,
and now I know even less.
I feel like a door-to-door
salesman who sells doors,
knocking on locked examples
of what I try to sell.
Life's an elaborate experiment
with no hypothesis and with a
volatile concoction of methods.
Once you get the results, you
move on to Heaven, I gather,
and make your report--angels
roaring with laughter:
apparently this stuff never
gets old. . . .
I passed two women on the street.
The one smoking a cigarette was
saying to the other, "Well, if
it's one thing I've learned from
experience, it's . . .". I'd
walked too far past to hear the rest.
Copyright 2010 Hans Ostrom
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Saturday, September 11, 2010
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