It Is Only Cultural

It is Only Cultural (Afghanistan)

Afghans hate America, it’s a cultural thing mostly.
US, is a democracy, they want to bring peace,
stability and obesity. Wall Street in Kabul,
the rise and fall of shares eyes glued on screens.
Everything is priced and private and Afghanistan
is theme park. Phony Taliban black beards and
fake guns. Folkloric dressed they dance to the tune
of modernity and middle class trivialities.
Afghanistan, reduced to a pretty postcard, maxi
burgers bars and jeans, until self disgust wins and
Afghanistan goes back to its tribal ways.

poem by Oskar Hansen
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Late Night

Late Night

The woods in the fireplace is glowing embers,
promise nothing but an ending. In a yard a dog
bark to hear its loneliness, I tell it to stop it hears
me, curls up and goes to sleep. I take a safety pin
thread its needle end through my ear lobe and
I do the same with the other ear.

The blood is white like water, painless and
impartial. I look in the mirror and see nothing
that looks like a pirate. No escape from boredom
and I remove the pins. The dog’s wakes from its
slumber, barks. My ears hear Nirvana’s echo
rippling on the shores of eternity.

poem by Oskar Hansen
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a pessimistic view from a balcony in Paris

A Pessimistic view from a Balcony in Paris

Fine rain, open umbrella, sitting on the balcony of a hotel
overlooking Haussmann – Saint Lazare. A throng of people
and cars, but something as changed, people drinks Starbuck
coffee and eat burgers on the hoof. Old restaurants are
closing or converted to fast-food joints. I sigh and drink from
a bottle of Bordeaux to avoid getting rainwater in my wine.
This place together with rue d’Amsterdam used to be where
the posh people lived and now, safe for the ruddy scrap yard
tower, this could have been downtown New York.

poem by Oskar Hansen
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Hiver Plein De Mecontentement

Hiver plein de mécontentement

L'air sur l'Europe est clair et froid,
Sur ma terrasse, le parasol est refermé,
Voile légère sur une caravelle paisible.

L'étang tout près des maisons est pris en glace,
Le soleil est sans force, mais rend la nature
Semblable à une jolie carte postale.

Comme la compassion de l'étang est rudement gelée,
Le sol que je foule est rigide,
Tel le visage de l’amère tristesse.

Parmi les oliviers sans voix, un oiseau
Lance un avertissement et, dans le silence
Qui suit, j'entends des tambours de guerre.

Jan Oskar Hansen

poem by Oskar Hansen
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Colibri A Sonnet

Colibri (sonnet)

Beautiful colibri your fluttering wings
so rapid it looks like you are still in air…
drinking with your long sleek beak
forbidden nectar from the honey tree.
You fly from tree to tree care not who
you hurt with your purr of love.

Humming bird so lovely you are, totally
amoral, I will catch one day put you in
a cage, serve you sweet honey from a jar,
the one in the fridge with a picture of
a bee on, and you will buzz for me alone
till I set you free… if I ever do.

For I too need to hear the sound of love
and dream of being totally immoral.

poem by Oskar Hansen
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What Heppened To Laughter?

What Happened to Laughter?

What I miss the most not being a child, is its exuberance.
The easy tears and laughter, to jump up in the air for no
reason at all other that it gave a dizzying sensation.
I loved to go to circus, laughed uproar sly at the clown
and admired the lion tamer with his whip.

These days a clown’s mask is an unfolding tragedy and
animals should be free to survive or die in the wild.
But I still hanker for the days of innocence which is so
utterly lacking in morality. Now I seek refuge behind
irony a place where to hide my tears and hilarity.

poem by Oskar Hansen
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Frost Roses

Ice Roses
Frost on windows? Not where I live now, but where
I grew up, winter windows had thick layers of ice.
And in mornings, before anyone got out of bed, I
carved landscape and faces and saw my work fade
slowly away, by noon I could see the landscape
I had carved through clear windows, the mountain’s
stream, frozen solid now, and trees; mother’s face
also as she was busy in the kitchen baking bread.
I do not miss the cold Nordic land I came from, but
wish windows here too have frost roses, or be as
blank as a new page I could write. “I love you on.”

poem by Oskar Hansen
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The Price Of Water

The little lake, not far from the houses, has been
dry for years and is full of thistles and rubbish.
By, what was its shore, the sad rest of a rowboat
I remember it was blue, and someone had nicked
its oars; for firewood I take it. I used to row in
this lake in the evening catching trout.

When the moon made the lake into shimmering
silver my heart got quite wobbly by the beauty.
Last week I crossed the lake on my scooter, it was
not easy I lost my balance and was badly stung,
gasped for air, felt as drowning in a dry lagoon.
In the future the new commodity will be water.

poem by Oskar Hansen
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Barfly

Barfly.

Outside a bar, Bella Vista, in the sleepy town of Barranquilla-
Colombia- a donkey wore a hat with holes for its ears, dozed.
Hot day, its serenity was endless. Around its closed eyes blue
flies crawled. I’m kind to animals, waved my hand in front of
its eyes to get rid of flies. The beast saw it differently, kicked.
In the street only the donkey, me and the cruel midday sun,
everyone else had sought refuge the dark interior of houses.
Looked at the bar’s dark, cool interior, since the beast didn’t
care for my sympathy I limped back in there and had a beer.

poem by Oskar Hansen
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Oil & Democracy

Democracy and Oil

When rebels wave the magic banner of democracy,
the west acts blindly like a troll caught in daylight.
They run around and holler democracy and fig leaf,
Norway drops bomb for the sake of peace. History
for those who care to read, it is hundred years ago
that Italian air-force dropped bombs over Libya.
Small, small bombs, yet big enough to kill women
and children on the ground. Gaddafi, a low hanging
fruit must go; Oil must be democratically privatized-
given to the big oil companies- And that what this
war is all about...sole western access to energy.

poem by Oskar Hansen
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