Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
A Spondee for Parents Who Complain About School Being Cancelled When a Tropical Storm Approaches
Shut up
Wednesday, September 2, 2026
A Spondee for Parents Who Complain About School Being Cancelled When a Tropical Storm Approaches - one spondaic foot
Reading Basho on a Rainy Morning - a poor attempt at Haiku
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
Reading Basho on a Rainy Morning
When I read Basho
I am properly chastened
For my ignorance
Basho: The Complete Haiku of Matsuo Basho
Translated and edited by Andrew Fitzsimons
Oakland: University of California Press, 2022, 2024
Tuesday, September 1, 2026
Civil Penalties for Mailing Anything Dangerous - poem
Lawrence
Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
“Civil Penalties
for Mailing Anything Dangerous”
…our children will be ashamed…
remembering
how in so strange a time
common
integrity could look like courage
-Yevtushenko, “Talk,” in Selected Poems: Yevtushenko
The postmistress chants this as part of her list to us
Whenever a citizen sends a package by postal bus:
Civil penalties for mailing anything dangerous
Firearms, fireworks, a radioactive truss
Air bags - and why mail one? (just an aside)
Poisons, perishables, formaldehyde
The cremated ashes of your cousin Clyde
Or anything else on the weirdo side
Logical enough
But in these fearful days, under our mad regime
Mailing even a thoughtful letter is a dangerous scheme
Saturday, August 29, 2026
A Pinball Game with Some Come-to-Jesus Music - poem
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
A Pinball Game with Some Come-to-Jesus Music
The ritual signing of a padded book
And then invisible paddles launch us into the game
Among electrical bumpers of whisperers
Clustered in their several corners and slots
Suspicious smiles that don’t conceal holy hate
As they repel outsiders through platitudes
Invisible daggers fly through the sacred air
The silent sibilant hisses are heard all the same
The dear departed in his old Sunday suit
Seems to smile in peaceful anticipation
of being rid of all of us
Ka-Ching!
Exit the Hurricane, 2017
Lawrence
Hall
mhall46184@aol.com
a repost from 2017
Exit the Hurricane, 2017 (not the
catchiest title, eh?)
What is that silence? It is the not-rain
The first not-rain since Friday this past week
Every loud frog gloats in unseemly song
As old, sour water recedes from the door
The whole house stinks; it stinks of damp and rot
Of clothes unwashed because the drains are dammed
Of smelly shoes and even smellier socks
Of refugee gear flung casually about
The whole house stinks; it stinks of damp and rot
Of too many people – and isn’t it wonderful!
Lunch Poems and an Olivetti - poem
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
Lunch Poems and an Olivetti
oz.Typewriter: Poet Frank O'Hara and the Olivetti Lettera 22 Portable Typewriter
When Frank O’Hara poemed on an Olivetti
At a typewriter shop on Fifth Avenue
He pulled out a sheet of paper which did not read
Error 1101 Ray ID: a324930b6bd1e5a5 • 2026-08-28 16:08:24 UTC
Worker threw exception
Lunch Poems and a Subaru - poem
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
LogoSophia
Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
Lunch Poems and a Subaru
“The world is full of
people who want to tell you how to live…”
-attributed to Gus in
Lonesome Dove
When I
picked up a copy of Lunch Poems
I didn’t
know I was required to be gay
And when I
bought a fine new Subaru
I didn’t
know I was required to be
a feminist lesbian professor with big round glasses and short grey hair
The World's Tallest Wooden Skyscraper - a poem written on a matchstick
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
The World’s Tallest Wooden Skyscraper
Anybody got
A match?
Thursday, August 27, 2026
After the Drought: Living Water - a modest attempt at Haiku
Lawrence
Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
After the Drought:
Living Water
Sweet rain greens the grass
Like baptism or mikvah
Making the world new
Today Lake America, Tomorrow the World! - intemperate political poem
Lawrence
Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
Today Lake
America, Tomorrow the World!
The USS Trump has departed the Straits of America
And is sailing across the South Trump America Sea
Enroute to ThaiTrumpland, His fifty-fifth state
For a Trumptorious port call at Trumpkok
From thence across the Trump America Ocean
The bigliest Trump ship the world has ever seen
Helmed by General Admiral Trump, Our Trump
Who declares victory over loser Canada
And awards each sailor and Marine
The Golden Order of the Reflecting Pool
Good for discounts at the catering truck
Thank you for your attention to this matter
I Hadn't Realized How Young We Are - poem
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
I Hadn’t Realized How Young We Are
Instructions for living a life:
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.
-Mary Oliver, "Sometimes"
I hadn’t realized how young we are
As through this field we stroll, your hand in mine
But love has seen us safely through this far
With hearts in time with each other, with eyes that shine
We were young once, and how wonderful to be
Still young in the promises we made
And in our long togetherness thus free
To love as one in this moonlit summer glade
As through this field we stroll, beneath the evening star
I realize how wonderfully young we are
Tuesday, August 25, 2026
"Just One More Thing..." - for Peter Falk
Lawrence
Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
“Just One More
Thing…”
A well-chewed cigar
A seven-years’ rumpled coat
A fine-tailored heart
Monday, August 24, 2026
The U.S.S. Doris Miller - a Tall Ship for a Tall Man
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
The U.S.S. Doris Miller – a Tall Ship for a Tall Man
"And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by"
-John Masefield, “Sea Fever
Iron and Steel
For now she is only numbered heaps of steel
Laid out in structure-order at Newport News
Muscled into being through thought and power
Strong craftsmen of the builders’ brotherhood
CVN 81
The lifts, the links, the wirings, the welds, the works
Plans, bolts, tools, heat, sweat, pain, maybe some blood
A touch of salty language for motivation
And then someday
“God bless this ship and all who sail in her”
The Soul of a Ship
The Doris Miller will sail, will range wide and far -
And Doris Miller himself will be her star
An Idyll of the Decorator-in-Chief - intemperate political doggerel
Lawrence
Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
An Idyll of the
Decorator-in-Chief
Yes, makin’ mock o’
uniforms that guard you while you sleep
Is cheaper than them
uniforms, an’ they’re starvation cheap
-Kipling
Americans are a couch-bound people who
Applaud a souffle being fluffed on t.v.
And argue the fine points of Chef So-and-So’s roux
While their sailors and Marines go hungry
across the sea
Sunday, August 23, 2026
"I Don't Know What's Going on in There!" - poem
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
“I Don’t Know What’s Going on in There!”
“Oh, you have made me very angry, very angry indeed!”
-Marvin the Martian in a Bugs Bunny cartoon
The convention would be to say he stormed out of church
But in his time of life he can’t storm at all
Except maybe like Marvin the Martian
(If Martians suffer arthritis and age) while I held the door for him
(No, not for a Martian, for a creaky, cranky old earthling)
“You saw me come in! I came to Mass! Now I’m going out!
I don’t know what’s going on in there! It’s all a mess!
And I don’t have to put up with it! I’ll watch Mass on t.v.!”
I never learned what was going on in there
Divine services are like that – what do we really know?
But he, and I, and you – we just do our best
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