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In Vienna
How the fuck did I get here? I asked myself.
Winter. Yes, yes: the opera, the history,
the goddamned magnificence. A big so what?
to all of that and more when you're thin
on money, low on rest, and loaded down
with many mistakes you made. Back "home,"
they'd elected Reagan president. That, children,
was a point of no return. Austria is
of great historical importance. Okay, fine,
but I'm hungry, I thought. So I went out,
and I went out, and I found myself a cafe,
which featured a kind of importance I
required--hot food and wine, buzz of
customers, glowing lights and cigarette
smoke, a blond woman with a wry
smile, and a sense of proportion.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
Monday, April 11, 2011
Without Acknowledged Passions
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Without Acknowledged Passions
"He was wary of solitary men, people without acknowledged passions." --Maigret and the Calame Report, by Georges Simenon, Chapter 3.
Like any advanced mammal, they calculate,
the ones with unacknowledged passions, but
their cruelty is cooler, reptilian. If they would
but name their passions, we'd all be safer.
The won't say what they really want, so
they try to exact things from us. Always
in a hurry, bustling with short strides,
keeping careful records, they don't
get much done. Always arguing, they
never convince. And always opining,
they make us crave facts. The ones
without acknowledged passions fail
by seeming to succeed--like an avalanche.
What is wrong with them can't be made
right. Don't try. Pass by.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
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Without Acknowledged Passions
"He was wary of solitary men, people without acknowledged passions." --Maigret and the Calame Report, by Georges Simenon, Chapter 3.
Like any advanced mammal, they calculate,
the ones with unacknowledged passions, but
their cruelty is cooler, reptilian. If they would
but name their passions, we'd all be safer.
The won't say what they really want, so
they try to exact things from us. Always
in a hurry, bustling with short strides,
keeping careful records, they don't
get much done. Always arguing, they
never convince. And always opining,
they make us crave facts. The ones
without acknowledged passions fail
by seeming to succeed--like an avalanche.
What is wrong with them can't be made
right. Don't try. Pass by.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
Plato, Kant, Life
Plato, Kant, Life
There is no categorical
imperative or Platonic ideal.
These things do not exist.
They are that. Life is this.
More imaginative than Kant
is God, who does not want,
who makes perfect sense,
who knows the original whence.
Plato imagined he knew
what to make of this stew,
life. His notions were less than ideal.
This stew is terribly real,
not approximation, God knows.
Out of mystery, not forms, creation flows.
We and life are history,
Whereas God is mystery.
God is neither categorical nor ideal.
God is rather formlessly real.
Copyright 2011
Saturday, April 9, 2011
Living With the Sound
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Living With the Sound
I've lived with the sound of what
are called fighter-jets all my life:
sonic-booms over the Sierra Nevada then,
air-scraping roar of weapon-laden planes
over Puget Sound now. It is
a sound denoting the American Empire.
That is a fair statement. Anyway, today
when the noise materializes, a cat
lifts its head instinctively, as if to try
to discern the sound through the ceiling.
I lift my head to look at the cat. The sound
has always been the sound of something
far above and beyond my control,
closer than the sky, farther
away than the moon.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
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Living With the Sound
I've lived with the sound of what
are called fighter-jets all my life:
sonic-booms over the Sierra Nevada then,
air-scraping roar of weapon-laden planes
over Puget Sound now. It is
a sound denoting the American Empire.
That is a fair statement. Anyway, today
when the noise materializes, a cat
lifts its head instinctively, as if to try
to discern the sound through the ceiling.
I lift my head to look at the cat. The sound
has always been the sound of something
far above and beyond my control,
closer than the sky, farther
away than the moon.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
My Country 'Tis
}
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}
My Country 'Tis
My country 'tis of thee, perpetual
detainee, of thee I sing. Land of
monopoly, most
massive military, of thee I sing.
Slavery for centuries, you've
still not made it right. You dim
reconciliation's light--and
you won't sing.
Developing every mountainside,
let your ears ring. Land with
more prisoners than it ever used
to have, land always
off to war, perpetual fights
abroad, of thee who sings?
Not a republic now, more
guns than privacy,
more hate than equity, melt
freedom's ring. My country
'Tis not "mine." Don't think
it ever was. I'm as powerless
as dryer-fuzz. "My" country
belongs to the powerful, oh yes,
and I can't sing. This country
'tis of thee, perpetual detainee,
"combatant enemy," of thee
who sings? There is a They
and We, surveilled ubuity,
you'd better talk--or else:
Yes, sing, sing, sing.
From every mountainside,
let indus-military glide--
pollutants: smear them wide--
of thee. Of thee. What can
I do about thee, "my" distant
country? Not much, not much,
I fear. I cannot sing.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
}
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My Country 'Tis
My country 'tis of thee, perpetual
detainee, of thee I sing. Land of
monopoly, most
massive military, of thee I sing.
Slavery for centuries, you've
still not made it right. You dim
reconciliation's light--and
you won't sing.
Developing every mountainside,
let your ears ring. Land with
more prisoners than it ever used
to have, land always
off to war, perpetual fights
abroad, of thee who sings?
Not a republic now, more
guns than privacy,
more hate than equity, melt
freedom's ring. My country
'Tis not "mine." Don't think
it ever was. I'm as powerless
as dryer-fuzz. "My" country
belongs to the powerful, oh yes,
and I can't sing. This country
'tis of thee, perpetual detainee,
"combatant enemy," of thee
who sings? There is a They
and We, surveilled ubuity,
you'd better talk--or else:
Yes, sing, sing, sing.
From every mountainside,
let indus-military glide--
pollutants: smear them wide--
of thee. Of thee. What can
I do about thee, "my" distant
country? Not much, not much,
I fear. I cannot sing.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
The Difference Between Poetry and Prose
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The Difference Between Poetry and Prose
What is the difference between poetry and prose?
is a question poetry never even thinks to ask at a party.
Poetry is too distracted looking at the curve of someone's
buttock, or tasting the word "vellum," which somebody
uttered a half-hour ago, or letting a whiff of vanilla cast
it into a pool of memory. Prose is the responsible sibling,
doing its duty to make something happen. Poetry assumes
everything's always happening already. It is
stoned, stunned, seduced, and stung by reality,
which just happens to be, according to poetry.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
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The Difference Between Poetry and Prose
What is the difference between poetry and prose?
is a question poetry never even thinks to ask at a party.
Poetry is too distracted looking at the curve of someone's
buttock, or tasting the word "vellum," which somebody
uttered a half-hour ago, or letting a whiff of vanilla cast
it into a pool of memory. Prose is the responsible sibling,
doing its duty to make something happen. Poetry assumes
everything's always happening already. It is
stoned, stunned, seduced, and stung by reality,
which just happens to be, according to poetry.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
Friday, April 8, 2011
Watch Out for Us
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Watch Out for Us
We're all around you, you know. There are
a lot of us--the ones who over-think things,
the ponderers. (Perhaps you're one of us:
what do you think?) We think of thinking
as vocation. Oh, yes, we're usually boring
or invisible or impertinent, in the best sense
of the latter word: think about it. If you ask
us what we think, however, we may defer
or deflect. We don't necessarily like sharing
what we think. That trait belongs to a different
sort. We just like thinking. At social events,
we might flash a smile, answer an arcane
question, or amuse briefly, but then we
always withdraw. Why? To get away
from noise and to think. What good are we?
Where does all this thinking get us, get you?
Ah, we think about those questions, too.
Oh, yes, you bet we do.
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Watch Out for Us
We're all around you, you know. There are
a lot of us--the ones who over-think things,
the ponderers. (Perhaps you're one of us:
what do you think?) We think of thinking
as vocation. Oh, yes, we're usually boring
or invisible or impertinent, in the best sense
of the latter word: think about it. If you ask
us what we think, however, we may defer
or deflect. We don't necessarily like sharing
what we think. That trait belongs to a different
sort. We just like thinking. At social events,
we might flash a smile, answer an arcane
question, or amuse briefly, but then we
always withdraw. Why? To get away
from noise and to think. What good are we?
Where does all this thinking get us, get you?
Ah, we think about those questions, too.
Oh, yes, you bet we do.
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Nothing Less
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Nothing Less
On the brink of exhausting the Earth, it's
past time to re-think, don't you think?
The scandals of nuclear weapons,
starvation, species eradication. Chasms
between rich and poor . . . . Nothing less
than a revolution of spirit shall suffice.
The age seems to beg for moral transformation,
by which we agree to think ahead by centuries,
not quarter-years. Short-term profits
shall be anathema. A certain selflessness
must obtain. We have to mine it within
ourselves. It's there. Refine it--that ore
known by an old-fashioned name, virtue.
Nothing less than a revolution of the spirit
shall suffice, I think, when I think twice.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
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Nothing Less
On the brink of exhausting the Earth, it's
past time to re-think, don't you think?
The scandals of nuclear weapons,
starvation, species eradication. Chasms
between rich and poor . . . . Nothing less
than a revolution of spirit shall suffice.
The age seems to beg for moral transformation,
by which we agree to think ahead by centuries,
not quarter-years. Short-term profits
shall be anathema. A certain selflessness
must obtain. We have to mine it within
ourselves. It's there. Refine it--that ore
known by an old-fashioned name, virtue.
Nothing less than a revolution of the spirit
shall suffice, I think, when I think twice.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
Better Than Television
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Better Than Television
This week I encountered several people who talk
constantly out loud to themselves in public. Out
very loud. It's interesting how they are at once
accepted and normatively abnormal: I experience
curiosity and wariness. Also of interest is that
I don't listen carefully to them. If I did, I'd have
to follow them because they're almost always
on the move, and it would be rude to follow them.
But it's a missed opportunity, not listening, I suspect.
Maybe it's gibberish, maybe it's not: I don't know.
But it has to be better than television. At least.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
(
(
(
Better Than Television
This week I encountered several people who talk
constantly out loud to themselves in public. Out
very loud. It's interesting how they are at once
accepted and normatively abnormal: I experience
curiosity and wariness. Also of interest is that
I don't listen carefully to them. If I did, I'd have
to follow them because they're almost always
on the move, and it would be rude to follow them.
But it's a missed opportunity, not listening, I suspect.
Maybe it's gibberish, maybe it's not: I don't know.
But it has to be better than television. At least.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
Monday, April 4, 2011
Final Engagement
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Final Engagement
The man told me twelve-hundred American
veterans of World War II die each month now.
The Macs and Johnnys, Jimmies and Franks,
farm-boys, city-boys; Black soldiers
once concentrated in separate divisions; men
who enlisted at Manzanar or Tule Lake; women
called WAVES whose names were Kay or
Gladys, Mildred, Lucille, Gloria, or Dolores;
conscientious objectors, veterans of another kind
of war; men with lifelong jitters, and worse, after
the war. It's the final engagement, in which 1200
perish per month, maybe more, their photos
ghostlike on local obit websites. It's the final
assault on the jitterbug and cherry blossoms,
high-balls, unfiltered Camels, the sound of Murrow's voice,
the Lindy Hop, silk nylons, hair oil, propellers,
and a deep reticence to talk with anyone about what
happened over there, over here.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
(
(
(
Final Engagement
The man told me twelve-hundred American
veterans of World War II die each month now.
The Macs and Johnnys, Jimmies and Franks,
farm-boys, city-boys; Black soldiers
once concentrated in separate divisions; men
who enlisted at Manzanar or Tule Lake; women
called WAVES whose names were Kay or
Gladys, Mildred, Lucille, Gloria, or Dolores;
conscientious objectors, veterans of another kind
of war; men with lifelong jitters, and worse, after
the war. It's the final engagement, in which 1200
perish per month, maybe more, their photos
ghostlike on local obit websites. It's the final
assault on the jitterbug and cherry blossoms,
high-balls, unfiltered Camels, the sound of Murrow's voice,
the Lindy Hop, silk nylons, hair oil, propellers,
and a deep reticence to talk with anyone about what
happened over there, over here.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
Sunday, April 3, 2011
Saturday, April 2, 2011
Friday, April 1, 2011
My White Body
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My White Body
My white body has brought me ease
in this USA society that's marked black
and brown bodies, that marks them still.
My body white and masculine has functioned
as a passport, yes it has. Has often let me
be as invisible or as noticed as I prefer.
Has allowed me to prefer. I hear the voices
of contrarians: Have my white body and I
been excluded, ignored, worked hard, and
maybe even hated? Oh, sure. But not so
as to make my white body's experience
and me equivalent to that of those marked
by this USA society. I've been reading
The Slave Ship: A Human History by
Marcus Rediker, 2008. You know, you
think you know, but you don't know--
that is why history is written, read.
Admit it. Admit you have a white body
according to the culture's rules, I told
myself. And let's not whitewash the issue.
This isn't Tom Sawyer's fence.
What's an admission worth? Not much.
It's a move, a mental shift. What must ensue
after the admission must be more productive
than just the admission. Otherwise the move
becomes just more hoo-hah from a mind inside
a white body. My white body has brought me ease.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
(
(
(
My White Body
My white body has brought me ease
in this USA society that's marked black
and brown bodies, that marks them still.
My body white and masculine has functioned
as a passport, yes it has. Has often let me
be as invisible or as noticed as I prefer.
Has allowed me to prefer. I hear the voices
of contrarians: Have my white body and I
been excluded, ignored, worked hard, and
maybe even hated? Oh, sure. But not so
as to make my white body's experience
and me equivalent to that of those marked
by this USA society. I've been reading
The Slave Ship: A Human History by
Marcus Rediker, 2008. You know, you
think you know, but you don't know--
that is why history is written, read.
Admit it. Admit you have a white body
according to the culture's rules, I told
myself. And let's not whitewash the issue.
This isn't Tom Sawyer's fence.
What's an admission worth? Not much.
It's a move, a mental shift. What must ensue
after the admission must be more productive
than just the admission. Otherwise the move
becomes just more hoo-hah from a mind inside
a white body. My white body has brought me ease.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
My Father Does Disapprobation
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My Father Does Disapprobation
Jesus Christ Almighty! my father used to say,
not speaking to, of, or for Jesus but to one or more
of his three sons, who had done something maybe
not even wrong but just imperfectly. He could be
thunderous in his disapprobation, which is a word
I never heard him say. He was the Jehovah
of our family--and an atheist: no competition.
Jesus Christ Almighty HIT the sonofabitch!!
he'd shout--concerning a sledge-hammer,
wielded by one of us, at a wooden stake.
A mere stake being driven into the mere ground!
Disproportionate furor! Magnificent, in its own
way, and in its own way Judeo-Christian: Old School.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
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My Father Does Disapprobation
Jesus Christ Almighty! my father used to say,
not speaking to, of, or for Jesus but to one or more
of his three sons, who had done something maybe
not even wrong but just imperfectly. He could be
thunderous in his disapprobation, which is a word
I never heard him say. He was the Jehovah
of our family--and an atheist: no competition.
Jesus Christ Almighty HIT the sonofabitch!!
he'd shout--concerning a sledge-hammer,
wielded by one of us, at a wooden stake.
A mere stake being driven into the mere ground!
Disproportionate furor! Magnificent, in its own
way, and in its own way Judeo-Christian: Old School.
Copyright 2011 Hans Ostrom
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