Quotation from "A Man For All Seasons," a play by Robert Bolt

 “If we lived in a State where virtue was profitable, common sense would make us good, and greed would make us saintly. And we'd live like animals or angels in the happy land that /needs/ no heroes. But since in fact we see that avarice, anger, envy, pride, sloth, lust and stupidity commonly profit far beyond humility, chastity, fortitude, justice and thought, and have to choose, to be human at all... why then perhaps we /must/ stand fast a little --even at the risk of being heroes.”

― Robert Bolt, A Man for All Seasons

Richard Eberhart's "The Eclipse"

 Fine six-line poem from Richard Eberhart--"The Eclipse." Recorded reading and video:

"The Eclipse"

A Poem About House Guests

 It's by Marianne Moore and conveys her father's philosophy toward visitors to his home.  Short--reading and video:

Marianne Moore poem

Garbage Mountain

 A man drives a long yellow tractor

across a mountain of garbage,

kneading the sickly sweet heap

all day. White gulls fall upon the feast

in shifts. What things have shown

themselves from the churning dream

& surprised the driver over the years

of riding the groaning diesel dinosaur?

Since we throw everything away,

anything could be inside

the writhing, slippery loaf

that cooks in sun heat and cools

in rain. Anything.

A Fine Poem by James Wright

 A short mystical poem by James Wright (1927-1980). One of those poems just to enjoy without pressing too hard for an explication. Text from allpoetry.com. Short video + reading:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_SeCuSrtmA

"You're in Wichita (And I Am Not),"

 I always wanted to write an old-fashioned "country" song with spare lyrics, so I gave it a go and came up with "You're in Wichita (And I Am Not)." with assistance from Roger Illsley, who wrote some music for it and performed and recorded it for Youtube:

"You're in Wichita"

The Genre of Sad Erotica

 In the genre of sad erotica, main

characters are tired and smell bad.

They feel too fat or too thin, too old,
too young or too middling. They touch
their bodies like they handle a heap of laundry.

They're hungry but too tired from work
to cook. Could be no one's there
to cook for them. Or someone's there
but mutual indifference grinds
the ambience like a glacier.

Oh, a bath would feel great but only after
booze or weed. Food delivered?
Microwave launched, cans slashed open?
Leftovers devoured like a dog's breakfast?

They sleep in front of a screen and wake
up confused, then vacant. So where's the
erotica? Well, maybe as bath or shower
stimulates flab and muscle, they think about

sex! They think about what sex might
bring. Oblivion of lust, the feeling
of being someone (well, something,
anyway) someone wants to touch. Alas,

in sad erotica, grotesquely realistic,
people get out of the shower and dry
themselves and put on cotton, linen,
or wool. Likely worn several nights
in a row. They walk slowly to a bed
or couch and fall, exhaling like beasts.

In sleep, maybe dreams of purple
romance, sizzling mystery, and molten
sex will riot. Finally, some action.

Giving Blood

 "We use your blood for babies," says the nurse.

“Give them my best,” I say. She nearly smiles.

The opaque bag darkens shadow-red
with my corpuscular tithing. Blood's

darkness always surprises me, suggests how
blood wells up from mineral earth like lava.

The blood-room’s hushed, as if we lying
on padded tables were sacrificial goats

with slit throats and the strong nurses, priests.
A tall woman or short man who used to be

a baby will stroll in flowered Paris one
day, pulsing traces of my blood, which

is O-Negative and CMV-Negative. My heart
never thought to teach me what these words

and letters mean. Do vampires carry all
types of blood, and is that why they’re

so pale and mean and unproductive?
I mean, get out of the casket, Drac,

go to bloodoholic rehab, give back to
the community. Just don’t donate blood,

and stay the hell away from babies...
Finished, I'm offered a cookie and juice.

hans ostrom 2022

"Hallelujah, Gloria," music video

 A glum day for multiple reasons. So I decided to make a lowest budget music video of a song that Roger Illsley (music) and I (lyrics) wrote that Roger recorded. We hope it's smile-worthy. Well, here it is:

"Hallelujah, Gloria"

"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