He's No Emperor

Well, we have to eat,

even as genocide, rapes,

atomic arsenals, and pious

bigotry persist, destroy, so

I roast beets. With a paring 

knife, I peel off dull hides,

reveal purple fiber of the roots.

Purple ink stains my fingers.

Has anyone painted with beet

juice? Chopped into small

pieces, the beets go in a

hot oven. When they're roasted

soft, I take them out, dribble

honey and shake salt on them,

serve with pasta and a simple

marinara sauce & a green salad,

plus a shared slice of a quick

raisin oat-bread I baked. I like

cooking for me and my wife.

It's a good thing, basic,

necessary. And about all

the influence I have

on the world, for as things

stand, I'm no emperor. 

hans ostrom 2024

Rondeau for a Father's Hat

And what am I to do with my Dad's hat?

Always a hat--he never wore a cap.
After he died, I've kept it all these years--
A little token of him, it appears--
A cloth thing under which he sat.

His body was cremated, so that's that.
To me his soul's a mystery, not a fact.
While I get old and face some stern cold fears,
What is it I'm to do with my Pa's hat?

I have been charged with being a pack-rat.
I'm sentimental, unlike our deadpan cat.
For me, things link to people, it appears,
And maybe soothe a bit some grieving tears.
"Just let it go": advice that sounds so flat
Regarding what to do with Father's hat.

Hans Ostrom 2024

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Bloomsbury Park

 (September 2022)

Bloomsbury Park
isn't melting yet
in the plump heat
of London, late summer.

A locust tree
shows tendons
and bends like an
arm at the elbow.

The only birds
are pigions. Brown
plates of stone make
a center square

and we strangers
sit on black benches.
We're mostly mute.
Cornflowers persist--

the rest of the beds
are parched like a
hangover. On my way
out, one pigeon escorts

me to the gate. We say our
forms of goodbye. I wonder
if one of his ancestors
spoke to Virginia Woolf.

The "melting" in the first stanza alludes to the famous/infamous Jim Webb song, "MacArthur Park," as sung-spoken by Richard Harris. "MacArthur Park is melting in the dark 

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Beware: The Billionaire is Angry

The billionaire's enraged. Angry

with women, with labor unions, with

"woke" people (but not mad enough

to say what he means by that word).

Lava-livid with academics,

except the ones whose research

undergirds his products. He's ticked

off with a former wife and a "disloyal"

child. He's not, though, especially upset

with neo-Nazis. Meanwhile,

the fellow who bags the groceries

people buy and retrieves carts

from the parking lot in cold rain,

cheerfully greets me. We exchange

polite words and laugh. He reminds

me not to forget that he's placed

items at the bottom of the cart.

"Yesterday, two people forgot theirs,"

he cautions. He seems to like

his minimum-wage job and life

well enough not to project rage.

The angry billionaire will "earn"

14 million dollars today. My mind,

as it doesn't forget to load the under-cart

items in the back of my car, goes

to Steve, the man who bagged

the tomatoes and rice and

so on. . . .  His red-bearded

face, full of good will. 

Hans Ostrom 2024

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Party Behaviors

 At the party, a light turned on

inside one woman and it shone

through her skin and shirt.

A man brought a private 

darkness with him. He climbed

inside it but still we heard his voice.

One person bent the air,

warping what we saw

making things seem to wiggle,

making us giggle. And some of

a verbose fellow's words became

visible and rose to the ceiling,

full of gas, helium, perhaps.

Only briefly did I become a 

turtle so as to be left alone. 

Hans Ostrom

Like a Turnip

It might start with the shriek

of a hawk or the ruining racket

of a jackhammer. Or with the low,

low flute note from a great horned

owl, or with the wail of a baby nearby. 

Anyway, a sound that seizes you,

uproots you from your moment,

like a turnip from damp soil,

and tosses you into the basket

of a different reality. Pulled

or pushed into one space

of the "real after" another,

only falsely sure we know

what's coming in the mirage's flow--

oh, such is life, life such as it is.

Hans Ostrom 2024