SELF-DRIVING TESLA INVOLVED IN FATAL CRASH

by Don Hogle

Kazimir Malevich. Suprematist Composition: White on White (Oil on Canvas, 1918) The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) 1935 Acquisition confirmed in 1999 by agreement with the Estate of Kazimir Malevich and made possible with funds from the Mrs. John Hay Whitney Bequest (by exchange).

“Neither autopilot nor the driver noticed the white side of the tractor-trailer against a brightly lit sky, so the brake was not applied.” —TESLA Blog, June 30, 2016

There were no casualties this morning
when Bluetooth failed to connect
an iPod to the Onkyo receiver
that sends the French news
to speakers in my living room.

Nor did the Mac screen shatter
when a pop-up popped up
with the fatal words Cannot
get mail.

In the blue Pacific, rainbow fish
swim in and out of coral
encrusted bone somewhere
near where Amelia dropped
from the sky.

A crew of astronauts burst
once from their capsule like stars
in a meteor shower, glittering
briefly in their yellow-red descents
over Texas and Louisiana.

Madame Curie may have failed
to notice the fatigue in her bones,
but she saw a faint light glowing
from the tubes she carried
in her pockets.

And those at MoMA,
who might have missed
the cool white square tilted
on the warm white background
of a canvas painted by Malevich,
were just bemused by what they saw.

Don Hogle is a poet, blogger and brand and communications strategist living in Manhattan. Poems have appeared recently in Mud Season Review, Minetta Review, Blast Furnace, Shooter, Bethlehem Writers Roundtable and TheNewVerse.News among others.  He was a finalist in the Northern Colorado Writers’ 2015 Poetry Contest. 

THE MOURNING AFTER 11/13/15

by Don Hogle

Image source: The Hip Paris Blog by Carin Olsson

On the bus to Lambertville this morning,
and the sadness and anger at 129 dead in Paris
hang over a stunning fall day
like the last note of the piano
concerto I heard last night,
Trifonov's delicate finger
barely grazing the key,
the lightest vibration, and then
the lingering silence…

What does it sound like
when a life dissolves?

Boucler Votre Ceinture
Abroche Su Cinturón de Seguridad
Fasten Your Seatbelt
the seat in front of me advises.

Bataclan, Charlie Hebdo
Atocha Station
Tower One Tower Two

No strap of nylon web will protect
us against the Promise of Paradise
and a Kalishnikov, the explosive
strapped to the heart, the Pilot
of the Terrible Belief.

What to do
is not a question
but a dilemma
set down in an open field
not for contemplation
nor consideration
nor inspection
but for interrogation.

For now,
three pieces of construction paper
one blue one white one red
taped to the window
of my living room
facing out onto our world,
and a black rectangle
posted on Facebook
pour la France,
for all of us,
but only
for three days.

Most of the trees are already stripped
here, but the green grass of central Jersey
rolls on, as the bus proceeds
toward Frenchtown.


Don Hogle is a poet, blogger and brand and communications strategist living in Manhattan.  Poems have appeared recently in Mud Season Review, Minetta Review, Blast Furnace, Shooter, Bethlehem Writers Roundtable and TheNewVerse.News among others.  He was a finalist in the Northern Colorado Writers’ 2015 Poetry Contest. 

CORRECTION

by Don Hogle

Excerpted and re-formatted from “NYT Now: Your Thursday Briefing,”

an email, August 6, 2015 at 3:15AM.

In Wednesday’s Morning Briefing,
we misstated the number of children

among the 150 people
killed in December

by militants at a school
in Pakistan.

There were
134 children,

not 13.

                   
Don Hogle is a poet, blogger and brand and communications strategist living in Manhattan. Mud Season Review, Minetta Review, Blast Furnace, Shooter, DoveTales, Outrider Review, Clapboard House and Dirty Chai are among the journals that have recently published his poetry.