Showing posts with label monologue. Show all posts
Showing posts with label monologue. Show all posts

Monday, November 30, 2015

Juvenal in the Desert

Who pays for the trespasses of the satirist?
In my case, the satirist. For my imaginative
attacks, I suffer dull imprisonment
in this shabby oasis.

To their minds, I'm uncivil,
self-righteous, and worst of all,
correct. I record the bulbous
nose as bulbous, the politician
as compulsively depraved,
the dreadful poet as pitiful.
Who pities me? Here

I see melons. Leather bags of wine
and water. Camels chewing nothing,
smirking. These odd desert people
in their smelly garments who
with their brand of irony let
me know I'm free to leave at
any time. Actually, not. The
shape of women's breasts
still fascinate me. Late

in afternoons, a little drunk
(all right: a lot), I see in
warping sand a chastened city
where fools are not honored.
Are not in power.


hans ostrom 2015



Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Blues for Esther Wagner

[Esther Wagner (1928-1989) earned a B.A. and a Ph.D. from Bryn Mawr. She taught at several liberal arts colleges, including the University of Puget Sound. She was a well read, generous conversationalist, colleague, and critic. She co-authored a novel, The Gift of Rome (1961) with one of her husbands, John Wagner. T.S. Eliot was a friend of her father's family, and she became friends with Erle Stanley Gardner, among other writers.]


It's too sad, darling.
But never mind, never mind.
Darling, never mind.

Let's pour a glass of sherry
and some goldfish crackers
and have a nice long chat.

Yes, we knew Eliot--Chicago.
We children referred to him
as Uncle Tom, darling--funny,
now that I think about it.

I always tell young people,
if you're sitting on a tack,
get up. This applies
to bad marriages, of course.

I'd glad you like Jarrell,
darling.. . . One encounters
ennui at mid-career. It
happened to me. If felt I'd
seen it all, read it all.
And for me, his poetry
came along at just the right time.

I don't believe in guilt,
I mean the emotion. A waste of time.
I also don't make any judgments
about people's sex lives--
consenting adults, you know,
and anyway, sex makes everyone
a little mad at one time or another.

Well, yes, it's hard to see
one's friends fall off the perch,
one by one. It's too sad. But never mind.

Get me another glass of sherry,please,
darling, and a beer for yourself--
and of course, I don't allow
beer bottles in the living room,
so do get yourself a glass.

Yes, the death's head on the ceiling,
above my bed. It's morbid to some.
Memento mori, darling.
It focuses the mind.

When I'm dying, I should like
to watch Roman Holiday
one more time. Lovely movie.

It's getting dark. And the rain.
It's too sad. But never mind,
darling. Never mind.


hans ostrom 2015



Friday, May 25, 2012

Thank You, Rogers

Thank you, Rogers, for your fine report
on our profit-outlook. You're fired. It's
a matter of over-head. Consult the
etymology of "capital" and work
on your resume, you diligent piece
of human resources.  As for the rest

of you: Fuck off. I got my bonus,
dare me to justify it, I win, you lose:
I am the point at which nihilism
and profit meet, baby.  There's nothing
like the high you get from sniffing
the spore from the lip of the
titanium-lined abyss.

I go to church, there is no God,
I wave the flag, there is no nation,
I fund a family for whom I'm alien,
there is no nature, it's raw material,
and long-range planning is
what suckers do. Toodle-oo.

The game is to sell tomorrow
today.  Rogers, be on your way.


Copyright Hans Ostrom 2012