"In 1940," by Anna Akhmatova

 The Penguin Selected Poems of hers, translated by D.M. Thomas, is a great intro to her poetry in English. Somehow she survived WW2 and Stalin's terror--many of her compatriots did not. The Akhmatova House in St. Petersburg, Russia, is now a museum. And there is a Joseph Brodsky room near the entry. You go through a small tunnel just off the street to get to the house, and the walls are covered with poetry graffiti. It's as if everyone has agreed to put only poetry graffiti up there; pretty cool. 

A reading of a short portion of "In 1940", with short video:

Akhmatova poem

Ragusa, Sicily: Festival Blues

At the Alta Villa Trattoria in Ragusa,

Sicily, as the St. Giorgio fest rolls

to a finish, you listen to small brass

bands haul their marches through

sun heat up toward the baroque 

cathedral, which manages to seem

at once imposing and cute. It's where

a solid silver ark holds "the bones

of various saints," an old man told you. 

George, the saint that counts, remains

forever young in painted wood, gentle

face, white horse, sharp lance. Later,

in an evening without breeze, everyone's

had about enough of whatever they thought

they'd come for in the festival. A hard woman

with a fish tattoo stuffs her phone in her jeans,

disgusted. She'll argue with anyone who 

wants to and some who don't. A toothless

ex-boxer is spruced up in an official white

shirt and red bandana. The Alta Villa 

Trattoria's mostly for locals. It's a living.

Nearby, the guy who sells hand-made

puppets plays Ella Fitzgerald all day,

so I stay, buying enough coffee & water,

salads &sandwiches, & bottles &

bottles of water to pay my way. 

"Memory of My Father," by Patrick Kavanagh

 Reading/video of a short poem by Patrick Kavanagh (1904-1967), well known Irish poet and novelist:

"Memory of My Father" video

Closing Time

 

Tonight my cabaret of fears

glowed and hummed.

A band played anxiety

in sharp keys. We asked

the bartender to remove

his Death costume and put

away the scythe. Insulted,

he yelled, “Drink up, last call!”

A good time was not had by all.

hans ostrom 2022

Treasure Enough

 slices of yellow peach

with a few blueberries

in a bowl. some water

and homemade bread.

outside, birds make

raucous noise, manic

after rain-showers. all

this is treasure enough.

hans ostrom 2022

William Butler Yeats goes full gothic!

 I hadn't read this poem until recently. A vampire poem from WBY.  Short poem, with reading and video:

"Oil and Blood" on Youtube

The Bees Work in the Rain

The bees work in the rain. Some climb

Into the orange of poppies, some

Into the blue and purple lavender.

So cold, so wet so late this year.

We have the Winter blues in June,

While elsewhere draught and fire say

The future's now. Do not begrudge the rain,

We whisper to our consciences, which will

Not hear. I dive into the weeding,

Get wet and chill and caked with mud.

But it's all right, as everything

From peonies to roses now

Is bursting into bright, and bees

Work in the rain and don't complain,

Must move the nectar now into the hives.

hans ostrom 2022

Concerning Bob the Bull

         (Lincoln, California)

I'm feeding sweet green clover

to a black and white bull

under powder blue sky. Through

silver fencing, I poke the offering,

a gesture of friendship to Bob

the bull, bedeviled by black flies

and close farm heat. Bob stares

and sniffs. Leans into me, almost

breaks my hand--a gesture

of friendship. I talk, he listens.

He snorts, sucks cud, and grunts.

I listen. I poke more green past

that glue-thick slobber on his black

lips, past his keyboard of square

ivory teeth and onto a pale pink

slab of tongue. Bob accepts

the clover without chewing.

He has a lot going on.

His patience in the midst

of fly-swarms and de-horning

outstrips Zen perfection. I tell

Bob of his greatness. Mourn

with him his lack of cow

companionship. His mucous

drips like icicle melt. We'll not

meet again--a scheduling thing.

I feel a sadness as sweet as

Bob's inner pools of cud.

How fine it would be one day

to hear Bob's story from Bob.

hans ostrom 2022

Abandoned Gold Mine

In the mine, looking at gray 

soil oozing water,

you feel the folly of digging

a hole in a mountain and hoping

wooden beams and air will hold up

all the rock above you. Mining

is faith. You look at rusted

iron tracks and the one tiny-

wheeled ore car no one stole yet.

This is a burrow where the Gold Rush

came to die. Yet even you,

fever -free, son and grandson

of gold miners, look at quartz

around your feet and want

to see deep yellow flecks,

desperately want gold to be.

Building, blasting, mucking,

loading, pushing, lifting. Sucking

rock dust in, coughing it out.

Stripping at end of day to show

you didn't steal high-grade ore.

Cuts, contusions. That's the search,

the work. The mine was not theirs.

Decades later, you stand in the cool

tomb and feel the drive that drove

them all here to lay down tracks

to trek into a mountain's dream.

hans ostrom 2022

Simple Wishes

I wish you warm 

copper dreams. I

wish you iron strength

on hardest days. May

ways you move

through life fit

often with the world.

Let mild rainstorms

roll perfumed breezes

toward your nostrils.

Let tastes of food

on hungry days bless

you with enough; and

send you satisfied

to a clean bed 

in a quiet place. And

may you hear songs

that take you by the hand

and walk you softly over

sweet grass to sleep 

and warm copper dreams. 

hans ostrom 2022

8 Billion Hearts

 At this instant 8

billion hearts pump

fuel to burn for birth,

work, war, talk, love,

joy, grief, hope... and

to keep greed, fear,

faith, and learning alive.

Each heart the same:

muscles, valves,

arteries. Electric

currents. But invented

differences reign,

brainlessly, with terror,

as if each heart were

not of similar design.

It's always a good

time to change, none

better than now. How?

Keep asking. Think of

8 billion hearts, their

syncopated beats.

hans ostrom 2022

Lie to Me, Sun

If we could really see sunlight, we'd see

it as a driven mist of grains--photons so finely

made they move through windows, skin, and eyes

and leaves of trees and plants, which turn them into

life. The photons run the planet while we proceed

with wrecking things, of course. Illusions of mere light,

its nuts and bolts invisible, are fine by me,

especially now, as May behaves like early March,

dark gray and wet and cold. The winter blues 

still thump like Ahab's wood on my soul's deck.

Sure, lie to me, Old Sun, with visible/invisible

rays of light. Light up things and me with little

quantum particles. Hell yeah. As long as you

come in and stay awhile, and save us once again,

and start the growing season and maybe kindle hope. 

The Bay of Today

In a gray bay, white sailboats

curve across what's for their

sailors now and for us past. 

Our Bay of Today is another

matter; it's blue, chipped

by whitecaps. In what seems

to be a sea of quantum

probability, no thing exists,

and all things just keep

happening. The universe

becomes an eventful

occurrence. Well,

everybody's got their

own lifeboat floating

in what seems like

the moment, with 

its carrots, rocks, and sky

and ways of wondering why. 

hans ostrom 2022