Monday, February 5, 2018
Former People (a Russian series, 14) - poem
Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com
For W. K. Kortas
We Former People have no reputation
So we are free to starve to death in peace
Or if we are unsightly in the street
Free rides to The Palace of Workers’ Justice
We might be beaten, we might be given a meal
Before we’re freed to a courtyard echoing
With the rattle of mop buckets and screams
And stood in liberating rows and shot
In glorious sacrifice to the Cause
Of progress and equality for all
mhall46184@aol.com
Former People
For W. K. Kortas
We Former People have no reputation
So we are free to starve to death in peace
Or if we are unsightly in the street
Free rides to The Palace of Workers’ Justice
We might be beaten, we might be given a meal
Before we’re freed to a courtyard echoing
With the rattle of mop buckets and screams
And stood in liberating rows and shot
In glorious sacrifice to the Cause
Of progress and equality for all
Jean Paul Sartre and Francis Thompson Walk into a Bar - poem
Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com
Jean Paul Sartre and Francis Thompson Walk into a Bar...
I fled it, down the minutes and down the hours 2
I fled it, from each InterGossip troll
I fled it, despairing, with weakening powers
But I could not escape the super bowl
1 No Exit, Jean Paul Sartre
2 “The Hound of Heaven,” Francis Thompson
(I recused myself from the annual high holy day liturgy sacred to the Republic, but can't escape the morning-after conversations.)
mhall46184@aol.com
Jean Paul Sartre and Francis Thompson Walk into a Bar...
No Exit 1
I fled it, down the minutes and down the hours 2
I fled it, from each InterGossip troll
I fled it, despairing, with weakening powers
But I could not escape the super bowl
1 No Exit, Jean Paul Sartre
2 “The Hound of Heaven,” Francis Thompson
(I recused myself from the annual high holy day liturgy sacred to the Republic, but can't escape the morning-after conversations.)
Sunday, February 4, 2018
A Letter from Ekaterinburg (a Russia series, 13) - poem
Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com
Dormition of the Theotokos
1917
Dear Alexei,
We are enjoying a beautiful summer –
The days have been perfect ever since spring
Cooler mornings now, and that’s about it -
Nothing exciting ever happens here
How is the new government working out?
Some of the banknotes are overprinted
With vague slogans covering the Czar, but
Nothing exciting ever happens here
Petrograd must be exciting for you, but
Nothing exciting ever happens here.
Write soon,
-Mitya
mhall46184@aol.com
A Letter from Ekaterinburg
Dormition of the Theotokos
1917
Dear Alexei,
We are enjoying a beautiful summer –
The days have been perfect ever since spring
Cooler mornings now, and that’s about it -
Nothing exciting ever happens here
How is the new government working out?
Some of the banknotes are overprinted
With vague slogans covering the Czar, but
Nothing exciting ever happens here
Petrograd must be exciting for you, but
Nothing exciting ever happens here.
Write soon,
-Mitya
"One of the Only" - poem
Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com
Why do men write of “one of the only”
Since one is only, and only is one
A singular figure, alone and lonely
“One of the only?” Oh, let it be done
With.
mhall46184@aol.com
“One of the Only”
Why do men write of “one of the only”
Since one is only, and only is one
A singular figure, alone and lonely
“One of the only?” Oh, let it be done
With.
Saturday, February 3, 2018
Uncle Vanya and Lady Godiva (A Russia Series, 12)
Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com
Uncle Vanya came strolling down the road
Wishing he had made something of his life
His young friend Anne loquaciously agreed
And with remarkable vehemence urged
him to endeavour to remediate his perceived inadequacies in the many precedent matters that burdened him…
Don Quixote suggested that worries were giants
Cassandra said, “There is only one page left”
Nick Adams whispered, “Shh! You’ll scare the fish!”
Ambrose Silk asked the way to the world’s end
And young Lady Godiva, sans chemise
Outsourced her image on souvenir tees
mhall46184@aol.com
Uncle Vanya and Lady Godiva
Uncle Vanya came strolling down the road
Wishing he had made something of his life
His young friend Anne loquaciously agreed
And with remarkable vehemence urged
him to endeavour to remediate his perceived inadequacies in the many precedent matters that burdened him…
Don Quixote suggested that worries were giants
Cassandra said, “There is only one page left”
Nick Adams whispered, “Shh! You’ll scare the fish!”
Ambrose Silk asked the way to the world’s end
And young Lady Godiva, sans chemise
Outsourced her image on souvenir tees
Friday, February 2, 2018
A Russian Series, 11: Strelnikov is still Wrong - poem
Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com
I used to admire your poetry…I shouldn't admire it now. I should find it absurdly personal. Don't you agree? Feelings, insights, affections...it's suddenly trivial now. You don't agree; you're wrong. The personal life is dead in Russia. History has killed it.
Don’t write to be approved by masters who
Wear Rolexes in the Name of the People
Don’t write to be approved by masters at all
But be your own authority and see
Your life – yours - is nobler than manifestos
The latest noisy Guelphs and Ghibellines
All Power to the Constituent Assembly
One folk, one nation, one waffle with syrup
Write freedom through verses, and disobey
Anyone who pushes you what to say
mhall46184@aol.com
Strelnikov is still Wrong
I used to admire your poetry…I shouldn't admire it now. I should find it absurdly personal. Don't you agree? Feelings, insights, affections...it's suddenly trivial now. You don't agree; you're wrong. The personal life is dead in Russia. History has killed it.
-Strelnikov in Doctor Zhivago (film)
Don’t write to be approved by masters who
Wear Rolexes in the Name of the People
Don’t write to be approved by masters at all
But be your own authority and see
Your life – yours - is nobler than manifestos
The latest noisy Guelphs and Ghibellines
All Power to the Constituent Assembly
One folk, one nation, one waffle with syrup
Write freedom through verses, and disobey
Anyone who pushes you what to say
Thursday, February 1, 2018
Contents of that Secret F.B.I. Memo - poem (of a sort...)
Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com
Next week the world is going to end again
When the north pole and the south pole switch places
According to secret radio transmissions
Secretly beamed from the secret headquarters
Of the secret Club of Rome far beneath
The Vatican and secretly aligned
With the secret sword of the secret Knights
Templar with the secret star WD-40
By our secret Masters on the secret
Planet Xenophobe in secret accordance
With the ancient prophecy of Cranium
The Elder discovered in a Prince Albert can
By the Portuguese philosopher and
Explorer Almoso Nutellaeus
Who thus received the dark secrets of the
Atlantean sorcerers in a secret
Language which only he was able to translate
When the Moon God Myrtle of the Aqua Kirtle
Blessed his Radio Shack TRS-80
With a rare pixie dust which can only be
Found in a certain secret plain in the
Sahara Desert at the Winter Solstice
Marked by a Bionic Blood Altar cursed
By the Knights of Toledo in a strange
Ceremony which can only be witnessed
By the Initiates of the Order of
The Cumulonimble Secret Ferrets
Of the Discalced Colossus of Roads
Whose emblematic pilum can be discerned
By pouring lemon juice over the pictures
Of the Caesars in a sacred clearing
In the secret Wood of the Thirteen Oaks
And a Loblolly Pine made when The Primal
Pole-er Bear from Beyond Time set up
The North Pole and the South Pole, and gave the
North Pole Santa Claus and the South Pole Little America
Station, and this Manichaean duality
Has set the planet in opposition
To itself, resulting in the cancellation
Of Gilligan’s Island after only three seasons
Because Gilligan and The Skipper were close
To discovering the Pre-Raphaelite
Anaemic Amoebic Astrolabe in yet
Another papier mache cave infested
By toxic golden hamsters of existential doom
Guarding a time-and-space portal leading
Directly to Oak Island where Captain Kidd’s
Lost cuff links (the ones with little pictures
Of Elvis golfing with leprechauns) can
Be found, the cuff links that channel the energy
Between The North Pole and the South Pole enhanced
By the chakra of a Hoover vacuum cleaner
Once used by Winston Churchill’s housekeeper
During the Blitz before she married her second
Husband, Trevor, who was the Hereditary
Keeper of the Keys of the Guernsey Privy
And thus a carrier of fairy blood
As required by Ye Ancient Lawes of the Booke
Of…something-or-other…which was carved in runes
On Roman skulls just before the loss of
The Island of Anglesey to Governor
Suetonius who was told by The Voices
That the Druids invented rock ‘n’ roll and
Must be destroyed so that the harmonic
Harmony of the North Pole and the South Pole
Could be restored to their primordial
Nordic vanilla pudding.
mhall46184@aol.com
Contents of that Secret F.B.I. Memo
Next week the world is going to end again
When the north pole and the south pole switch places
According to secret radio transmissions
Secretly beamed from the secret headquarters
Of the secret Club of Rome far beneath
The Vatican and secretly aligned
With the secret sword of the secret Knights
Templar with the secret star WD-40
By our secret Masters on the secret
Planet Xenophobe in secret accordance
With the ancient prophecy of Cranium
The Elder discovered in a Prince Albert can
By the Portuguese philosopher and
Explorer Almoso Nutellaeus
Who thus received the dark secrets of the
Atlantean sorcerers in a secret
Language which only he was able to translate
When the Moon God Myrtle of the Aqua Kirtle
Blessed his Radio Shack TRS-80
With a rare pixie dust which can only be
Found in a certain secret plain in the
Sahara Desert at the Winter Solstice
Marked by a Bionic Blood Altar cursed
By the Knights of Toledo in a strange
Ceremony which can only be witnessed
By the Initiates of the Order of
The Cumulonimble Secret Ferrets
Of the Discalced Colossus of Roads
Whose emblematic pilum can be discerned
By pouring lemon juice over the pictures
Of the Caesars in a sacred clearing
In the secret Wood of the Thirteen Oaks
And a Loblolly Pine made when The Primal
Pole-er Bear from Beyond Time set up
The North Pole and the South Pole, and gave the
North Pole Santa Claus and the South Pole Little America
Station, and this Manichaean duality
Has set the planet in opposition
To itself, resulting in the cancellation
Of Gilligan’s Island after only three seasons
Because Gilligan and The Skipper were close
To discovering the Pre-Raphaelite
Anaemic Amoebic Astrolabe in yet
Another papier mache cave infested
By toxic golden hamsters of existential doom
Guarding a time-and-space portal leading
Directly to Oak Island where Captain Kidd’s
Lost cuff links (the ones with little pictures
Of Elvis golfing with leprechauns) can
Be found, the cuff links that channel the energy
Between The North Pole and the South Pole enhanced
By the chakra of a Hoover vacuum cleaner
Once used by Winston Churchill’s housekeeper
During the Blitz before she married her second
Husband, Trevor, who was the Hereditary
Keeper of the Keys of the Guernsey Privy
And thus a carrier of fairy blood
As required by Ye Ancient Lawes of the Booke
Of…something-or-other…which was carved in runes
On Roman skulls just before the loss of
The Island of Anglesey to Governor
Suetonius who was told by The Voices
That the Druids invented rock ‘n’ roll and
Must be destroyed so that the harmonic
Harmony of the North Pole and the South Pole
Could be restored to their primordial
Nordic vanilla pudding.
A Russian Series, 10: A Soldier Smoking a Cigarette - poem
Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com
A soldier lay beside a railway line
Smoking a cigarette, not thinking of much
Among some hundreds of other conscript lads
Upon a grassy glacis above the fields
The boxcars waited in the stilly heat
The soldiers waited like young summer wheat
Occasionally stirred about by winds unseen
And finally stirred about by orders unheard
They rippled aboard, and were taken away:
Beside a railway line a shadow lay
mhall46184@aol.com
A Soldier Smoking a Cigarette
A soldier lay beside a railway line
Smoking a cigarette, not thinking of much
Among some hundreds of other conscript lads
Upon a grassy glacis above the fields
The boxcars waited in the stilly heat
The soldiers waited like young summer wheat
Occasionally stirred about by winds unseen
And finally stirred about by orders unheard
They rippled aboard, and were taken away:
Beside a railway line a shadow lay
Wednesday, January 31, 2018
A Russian Series, 9: The Fifth Karamazov - poem
Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com
When young we identify with Alyosha
His optimism and his innocence
His fragile, flowering Orthodox 1 faith
A happy, almost-holy fool for Christ
When older, the sensual Dimitri,
With irresponsible lusts and desires
Grasping for the rewards of the moment
Now, ever now, wanting everything now
Then older still, as intellectual Ivan
Sneeringly aloft, above all faith and flesh
A constructor of systems and ideas
From the back pages of French magazines
Though never do we identify with
Nest-fouling, leering, lurking Smerdyakov
Our secret fear, unspoken fear, death-fear:
That he might be who we untruly are
But hear, O hear, the holy bells of Optina 2
Those Russian messengers 3 singing to us
Inviting us to meet Alyosha again
At Father Zosima’s poor 4 hermitage
1 Russian Orthodox
2 The name of the real monastery upon which Dostoyevsky modeled his fictional one
3 The Brothers Karamazov was first published as a serial in The Russian Messenger
4 Poor only by secular standards
mhall46184@aol.com
The Fifth Karamazov
When young we identify with Alyosha
His optimism and his innocence
His fragile, flowering Orthodox 1 faith
A happy, almost-holy fool for Christ
When older, the sensual Dimitri,
With irresponsible lusts and desires
Grasping for the rewards of the moment
Now, ever now, wanting everything now
Then older still, as intellectual Ivan
Sneeringly aloft, above all faith and flesh
A constructor of systems and ideas
From the back pages of French magazines
Though never do we identify with
Nest-fouling, leering, lurking Smerdyakov
Our secret fear, unspoken fear, death-fear:
That he might be who we untruly are
But hear, O hear, the holy bells of Optina 2
Those Russian messengers 3 singing to us
Inviting us to meet Alyosha again
At Father Zosima’s poor 4 hermitage
1 Russian Orthodox
2 The name of the real monastery upon which Dostoyevsky modeled his fictional one
3 The Brothers Karamazov was first published as a serial in The Russian Messenger
4 Poor only by secular standards
Tuesday, January 30, 2018
A Russian Series, 8: "Withdrawn from Salem Public Library" - poem
Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com
“Salem Public Library, East Main Street,
Salem, VA 24153”
A happy book, thought-stained, and often-read:
An anthology of Russian poetry
Salem, Virginia must be a marvelous town
A library stocked with poetry, and stocked
With poetry readers who have turned again
And again to favorite pages here and there
Long-ago poets murdered by the Soviets
But finding love at last in Salem, Virginia
Re:
20th Century Russian Poetry: Silver and Gold
Selected and with an introduction by Yevgeny Yevtushenko
Albert C. Todd and Max Hayward, editors
New York: Doubleday. 1993
mhall46184@aol.com
“Withdrawn from Salem Public Library”
Yevtushenko in a Used-Book Sale
“Salem Public Library, East Main Street,
Salem, VA 24153”
A happy book, thought-stained, and often-read:
An anthology of Russian poetry
Salem, Virginia must be a marvelous town
A library stocked with poetry, and stocked
With poetry readers who have turned again
And again to favorite pages here and there
Long-ago poets murdered by the Soviets
But finding love at last in Salem, Virginia
Re:
20th Century Russian Poetry: Silver and Gold
Selected and with an introduction by Yevgeny Yevtushenko
Albert C. Todd and Max Hayward, editors
New York: Doubleday. 1993
Monday, January 29, 2018
A Russian Series, 7: And Every Strand of Barbed Wire is Excused - poem
Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com
And Every Strand of Barbed Wire is Excused
Perhaps the sound is pleasant to the ear
The concept that free men and women can choose
Wisely wise leaders wisely to lead them
Backwards, crashing the gates of Eden lost
And building there a world of perfect peace
No matter how many millions must die for it
And every strand of barbed wire is excused:
“Oh, well, at least we got rid of the Czar.”
The firing squads, the cries of dying children -
Perhaps those sounds are pleasant to the ear
mhall46184@aol.com
And Every Strand of Barbed Wire is Excused
Perhaps the sound is pleasant to the ear
The concept that free men and women can choose
Wisely wise leaders wisely to lead them
Backwards, crashing the gates of Eden lost
And building there a world of perfect peace
No matter how many millions must die for it
And every strand of barbed wire is excused:
“Oh, well, at least we got rid of the Czar.”
The firing squads, the cries of dying children -
Perhaps those sounds are pleasant to the ear
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