The Poetry of William Hammett

Tuesday, June 24, 2025

Bukowski

Well, I mean you know at the start it seemed
mostly living with whores in rundown apartments,
maybe in New Orleans and maybe elsewhere,
chopping garlic cloves and riding the bus,
confessional to a fault, words splayed on a page,
mostly alphabetical scattershot thrown at the wall
to see what sticks, but maybe you were howling like Alan
or riding a Coney Island mind, a Ferlinghetti whirligig,
a metronome ticking to the beat of a Beat
over and over again while drinking gin.

You could just as soon have written

about Vaseline hair or Thousand Island dressing

or some female French Quarter anatomy

wrapped in a kimono, and maybe you were

as free and loose as Mary Oliver,

only with a little heron acid trip thrown in

for some seasoning, word jambalaya on the bayou,

and in the end I guess it was kind of hip,

kind of cool with a standup bass

and poetry slams in a coffeehouse kind of way.

~William Hammett

Site Map

Tuesday, June 17, 2025

The Chess Players

Old men in checkered shirts
and khaki trousers with winding creases
sit on stone benches in the park.|
Arthritic fingers—the instruments

of mortal gods fighting anachronism—

swap knights, bishops, and pawns.

The October day is chilly and gray,

an opening move to clouded sunset

wider than eighty-year-old yawns.

Up and down the line of speculation

there are mates and checkmates,

coughing laughter beneath cataracts

among old friends and warriors

talking about queens, their wives

who fell to the board because of age

that even a Russian gambit couldn’t save.

It is hard to distinguish thumbs

from the knuckles and knots of bare trees

grabbing for the curtain of evening

that will sweep away kings and royal pleas.

Soon the day will fade to black,

and the sky, or time itself,

unwinding all of the game clocks,

will checkmate empty pants and shirts.

~William Hammett

Site Map

Wednesday, June 11, 2025

Shadow and Light

In the study, quiet with dust,
the lamp’s small sun spills gold
over the tired oak desk.
Outside, trees begin to undress,

each leaf a farewell

dissolving like breath.

The large globe sits

in mahogany crosshairs,

oceans smudged with blue,

continents yellowed by years.
I turn it gently, a god exhibiting latitude.

We are always traveling, even here.

The faded rug recites its history
in threads of rust, plum, and smoke.
The season shifts—a whisper of wind,

a scattering of seminal seed

for a time that is only prophecy in October.

Books stand quiet like lines of school children
unable to move through afternoon’s honey.
Even shadows seem contemplative,

long fingers reaching for something lost.

A sparrow pecks the pane and vanishes,

a reminder that morning has passed,

that light and dark are trading places.

At peace, I close the book I wasn’t reading,
letting the moment rest in my hands.

Evening sweeps through the room
as the world turns, unhurried and unseen.

~William Hammett

Site Map

Thursday, June 5, 2025

The Weak Winter Sun

The weak winter sun
kisses glassy snow,
but not with passion
that would make lips part
or flesh melt into lascivious love.

It slides without a sound

into the pincushion metropolis,

a single coat of yellow

splashed on the sides

of city scrimshaw, spires

of metal, stone and glass,

on streets bathed in epiphany

for the blink of a circadian eye.

Pedestrians lumber

in and out of hope,

in and out of color splayed narrow,

arms and legs plodding through honey,

the air thick and cold,

mosquitoes eventually caught in amber.

It is a tease, a prostitute

slipping along gray pavement

with the promise of joy

at an hourly rate

until spring reforms the miniskirt,

until the long thaw of love

turns green under a godly sun.

~William Hammett

Site Map