Today's Special: Pot Roast with Two Sides - poem

Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com

Today’s Special: Pot Roast with Two Sides

For W.K. Kortas

In Response to his Sonnet for Wednesday’s Meatloaf

It’s an unusual pot roast, of course
Having only two dimensions, two sides
Incomplete on the space-time continuum
But free of fat, gristle, and growth horsemones

You can’t take a picture of it in 4-D
Because it appears only in 2-D
But how did you like the presentation
In a bed of herbivores all named Herb

It’s an unusual post roast discourse
In featuring only two sides of a horse

The Tree of Life has Many Branches - poem

Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com

The Tree of Life has Many Branches

“Thy people shall be my people”

-Ruth 1:16

Smoke rises here from foul Gehenna’s fires
Fires set by souls twisted like cold barbed wire
Sole argument of ideologies
Strung geometrically from hate to hate

Smoke rises here; soft ashes fall as death
Torah, Mishnah, and Gemera – and us
For without the Word and the People Israel
We are but wraiths, and darkly blown about

O Israel!

You are the broom tree in the wilderness
The Tree of Life who shelters all with love
You are the tent of Sarah and Abraham
And we are blessed who find refuge in you

About that Prayer-Meeting Thing - column

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall461994@aol.com

About that Prayer-Meeting Thing

An Ulster Scot may come to disbelieve in God, but not to wear his week-day clothes on the Sabbath.

-C. S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy

A body styling its collective self as the Freedom from Religion Foundation recently sent a hissy-fit letter to Newton County, Texas Sheriff Billy Rowles because of his eloquent use of a local metaphor. The words that the foundation found “alarming” were “prayer meeting” (cf. Beaumont Enterprise, KJAS Radio, and The Jasper Newsboy).

Eeeek.

So there we are for the next horror movie: a monster crashes through the woods devouring teenagers and bellowing “prayer meeting!”

A well-brought-up monster would not bellow with its mouth full, of course.

I think “prayer meeting” is one of Grendl’s Dane-ripping cries in Beowulf.

In local usage “prayer meeting” can mean:

1. Denotatively, an occasion on which people with a shared belief system gather informally over coffee or a nice glass of iced tea to discuss theological topics with reference to scripture and ecclesiastical authority, and to pray with and for each other.
2. Figuratively, an occasion when an authority figure sternly reminds someone of his (the pronoun is gender-neutral) responsibilities under the mutual obligations of civilized people.

Similarly, “a come-to-Jesus moment” can refer to a conversion experience, a sudden awareness of a bit of knowledge, or #2 as above.

These colorful and effective expressions are used and understood even by people belonging to other religious traditions or to no religion at all.

Well-read men and women of all cultures understand the concept of colloquialisms, even in Wisconsin where the Freedom from Religion Foundation is, well, foundated.

If one were to visit Israel he would no doubt find there lapsed Jews who still allude to Moses and the Prophets in conversation.

In India, the same for Hindus.

In East Texas the long-dominant Reformation tradition, waning but still significant, presents our common discourse with delightful usages which are celebrated by all.

C. S. Lewis, in his autobiography Surprised by Joy, remembers with great love and respect his old tutor, Mr. Kirk, a lapsed Presbyterian who, despite his professed atheism, put on his best suit to work in his yard on Sundays. Happily for Mr. Kirk, there was no Freedom from Religion Foundation to suffer the Aunt Pitty-Pat vapors about the association between divine services and one’s Sunday-go-to-meetin’ clothes.

I do not know what religion Sheriff Rowles professes (I’m reasonably sure he doesn’t worship trees, but I could be wrong). As St. Thomas More said, I have no window with which to look into another man’s soul. Furthermore, it is not my business, nor is it the business of the Freedom from Rational Thought Foundation. A civilized person’s only concern is that the sheriff is an honorable man.

And beyond all that, the Freedom from Growing Up Foundation is obviously ignorant (and I mean that in the worst possible use of the word) of Mr. Rowles’ service to this nation in Viet-Nam and to civilization in terrible times here twenty years ago.

The Miz Grundies of the Freedom from Religion Foundation appear to be much like Eustace Clarence Scrub in Lewis’ Voyage of the Dawn Treader, obsessed with their sour, parochial (so to speak) self-obsessions and perpetually hurt feelings, and ignoring the joyful sharing of cultures.

They are free to wallow in their fear; the rest of us are free to celebrate life.

-30-

On Refusing to MAGAbomb One's Self - poem

Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com

On Refusing to MAGAbomb One’s Self

In the midst of a world of light and love, of song and feast and dance,

he could find nothing more interesting to think of than his own prestige.

-C. S. Lewis, A Preface to Paradise Lost

Just look into the mirror, and there you are
Could lose a little weight, but there - you are
You comb your hair, you brush your teeth, and then
You should always remember to make a face

And laugh

For you are not a sloganed comrade-hat
Nor yet a shadow in a marching mob
A noise, a post, a bumper-stickered oaf
An obedient tool being pushed about

Because

You are not a tagged and labeled identity
But a true child of God, brave, loving, and free

Idylls of a Servant - poem

Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com

Idylls of a Servant

"The old order changeth, yielding place to new” 1

On that cold night Sir Bedivere looked long
Into the dawnlight where three Queens gold-crowned 2
With Arthur passed at last into the West
And the sun rose, but not upon the King

Then in the silence of the raw new year
A masterless knight turned unto the hills
And after wanderings there took the cowl
And among new faces told the beads of worlds

For us – our old year too is someone’s new
With quiet grace and faith we pass from view


1 This line appears both in “The Coming of Arthur” and in “The Passing of Arthur” in Tennyson’s Idylls of the King, framing the arcing narrative.

2 The three Queens, too, appear in “The Coming of Arthur” and in “The Passing of Arthur.” They are perhaps symbols of faith, hope, and charity from 1 Corinthians.

Marijuana in Newfoundland - poem

Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com

Marijuana in Newfoundland

It’s not marijuana in Newfoundland
In our fair Island we call it Product, b’ys
Son, have you been smokin’ Product again?
This is some ****in’ great Producttttttttt, ohhhhh, mannnnnnn

Mr. Speaker, why is there a shortage
Of Product in the province, Mr. Speaker,
Not worried about the stocks of cod if we
Can get stocks of Product, Mr. Speaker

And if the shipment from the mainland stalls
They’ll beam us some Product from Muskrat Falls



(Newfoundland is the most beautiful island in God's Creation, and the people
are a stew of languages and cultures who sometimes squabble, as happens in
happy families, but who are an inspiration to the world in their generosity,
class, character, and creativity.)

(Too bad about the recreational marijuana, though.)

An Oral Presentation in English Class - poem

Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com

An Oral Presentation in English Class

So, like, like, so, like, so, you know, like, so,
Like, so, like, you know, it was like, you know,
Like, so, like, you know, like, so, like, like, so,
Like, so, you know, like, so, like, so, like, like,

You know, it was like, you know, like, so, like,
So, you know, like, so, like, like, so, like, so,
You know, like, so, like, so, like, like, you know,
It was like, you know, like, so, like, you know,

Like, so, like, like, so, like, so, you know,
So, like, so, like, like, you know, actually…

If You Don't Believe in Something - poem

Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com

If You Don’t Believe in Something

If you don’t believe in something you’ll fall
For anything – but what if that something
In which you believe was that anything
For which you fell in the first place?

And what if that anything for which you fell
Was the something you ought to have believed
Before you fell into the anything
That maybe wasn’t there at all?

If you don’t believe in something you’ll fall
So check out our site: www.thing.y’all

An Autumn Bee Ballet - poem

Lawrence Hall, HSG
mhall46184@aol.com

An Autumn Bee Ballet

The garden out back needs mowing, but autumn bees
Good bees at work and play don’t see it that way
And spin about in the October breeze
Wind-spinning in the sun their bee ballet

The freshening winds have motivated them
To gather up and gather in the last
The last of summer goods from limb and stem -
Their easy harvests of spring have long since passed

They work, they know the winter winds will blow -
So I must find a different lawn to mow

Voting in my Primitive Village - poem

Lawrence Hall, HSG
mhall46184@aol.com

Voting in my Primitive Village

On Monday I will wear my uniform -
A blazer from Goodwill, old khaki slacks -
Knot my made-in-China patriotic tie
And verify that my papers are in order

On Monday I will sortie through the candidates -
I’m important to them on this one day -
Then work around their signs all slogan-trapped
And rush the doors through a hail of cliches’

And watched by comrades with their helmets blue
Vote for a Merovingian or two



Early voting begins in Texas on the 22nd of October.
Despite the many days and many opportunities and
many polling places only about 50% of the electorate
vote. The rest appear to be too busy complaining.

Murder in Constantinople - poem

Lawrence Hall, HSG
mhall46184@aol.com

Murder in Constantinople

As in an Agatha Christie mystery
A man - he ghosts into a consulate
As a flickering image upon a screen
The image, yes, but not the man is seen

          (A soft midnight splash in the Golden Horn)

As in an Eric Ambler mystery
Perhaps he is another Dimitrios
Another identity, and in the rain
Someone else slips aboard the Belgrade train

          (A soft midnight splash in the Golden Horn)

The inspectors inspect; the leaders lie:
We would not have it that Our subject should die

          (And softly flows the current through the Golden Horn)

Existential Despair in the Ohp...Opht...Eye Doctor's Waiting Room - poem

Lawrence Hall, HSG
mhall46184@aol.com

Existential Despair in the Ohp…Opht…Eye Doctor’s Waiting Room

Orderly rows of padded chairs among
Funeral home décor, fluorescent lights
HGTV eternally on TV
A really big and wide hi-def TV

On which attractive thirty-somethings yip
As they enter rooms: “OMYGOD! OMYGOD!”
What would they say if they encountered God –
OMYATTRACTIVELYFURNISHEDROOM!
OMYATTRACTIVELYFURNISHEDROOM!

And how many people with eye problems
Drive themselves to the ophthalmologist?

And did I spell “ophthalmologist” right?

Murder in Constantinople - column

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

Murder in Constantinople

“When you come to the point, it does go against the grain to murder an Archbishop.”

-Second Knight in T. S. Eliot’s Murder in the Cathedral

After murdering Thomas Becket in Canterbury Cathedral, the knights in Eliot’s play Murder in the Cathedral pause the action and address the audience in contemporary speech. Up to this point the play’s dialogue has been formal and in a broken sort of verse (apologies to Eliot-ans, but the man’s attempts at verse are obscure), but here the knights attempt to excuse their actions in prose. They are as evasive and as full of it as contemporary politicians covering their (tracks).

In real life King Henry, after his “Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest!” moment, had the four knights disappeared, as fans of John Le Carre’ might say. Assassins are as disposable as archbishops and journalists who forget their places.

Last week Jamal Kashoggi, a Saudi subject on some business or other, entered the Saudi consulate in Constantinople (only the ill-taught refer to that ancient city on the Golden Horn as Istanbul). He has not been seen since.

Rumor Control & Gossip Central have said that Mr. Kashoggi was murdered and dismembered, maybe not in that order, by Saudi secret agents and that his screams were broadcast by his exercise watch to his cell ‘phone outside the Saudi consulate. Maybe. Can exercise watches broadcast audio?

If there was a murder there will be no witness, for the operatives, like Mr. Kashoggi, will never be seen again. The Saudi crown prince has made friends and functionaries disappear in the past.

Recep Erdogan, the Turkish president who has stuffed lots of Turkish news correspondents into his prisons, purports to be outraged at someone else’s apparent rough treatment of a news correspondent.

Some foreign news sources have suggested that Jamal Kashoggi was a spy. Americans maintain that he was merely a journalist working for amazon.com’s in-house sheet The Washington Post.

That Mr. Kashoggi lived as long as he did is a surprise. According to our own overseas propaganda service, The Voice of America (https://www.voanews.com/a/who-is-jamal-khashoggi/4610403.html), Mr. Kashoggi’s family and pals include arms dealers, Osama Bin Ladin, former directors of the Saudi secret service, and Dodi Fayed. He may also have been associated with something called The Muslim Brotherhood. He was hired and fired and re-hired and re-fired by numerous news outlets, and after the assumption of power (in a coup?) by Saudi Arabia’s latest crown prince Mr. Kashoggi escaped from Saudi Arabia and into the arms of Jeff Bezos and The Washington Post.

Who and what was Jamal Kashoggi? Whose side was he on? Was he on the side of the good, the true, and the beautiful, or was he playing nations against each other?

Though the arm of a tyrant is long, Mr. Kashoggi was relatively safe in the U.S. Why did he travel to Turkey? Why did he enter the Saudi consulate there? For divorce papers? Really?

Our own crown prince and international arms dealer (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/18/world/middleeast/jared-kushner-saudi-arabia-arms-deal-lockheed.html) (https://www.businessinsider.com/saudi-crown-prince-jared-kushner-relationship-2018-3) is all palsy with the Saudi crown prince. Maybe those two bromance partners could get together over afternoon tea and sort out what happened to Mr. Kashoggi.

“So if we seemed a bit rowdy…”

-Second Knight

-30-

A Person of Interest - poem

Lawrence Hall, HSG
mhall46184@aol.com

A Person of Interest

The smoking gun is interesting enough
As is the bloody knife dripping with guts
And his meth-headed beheading of his child
But otherwise – who would be interested in him?

The Cold is More Poetic than the Warm - (this poem is not nearly as drippy as it sounds)

Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com

The Cold is More Poetic than the Warm

The cold is more poetic than the warm
A man coat-huddled against December’s winds
Evokes more sympathy in those dark days
Of stinging sleet and menacing blue clouds

The warm is less poetic than the cold
A man hat-shielded against September’s sun
Evokes no sympathy in those bright days
Of dripping sweat and dripping-too sun screen

And though McKuen sang “Listen to the warm”
There’s music in the cold while icicles form



(Your grandmother and I are the only two people who
will admit that they still love Rod McKuen.)

The Last Christmas for Sears and Roebuck - as a poem

Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com

The Last Christmas for Sears and Roebuck

Where can one shop for Christmas if not at Sears:
J. C. Higgins sporting goods, Craftsman tools
Kenmore sewing machines, wonderful toys
The greatest candy counter in the world

And, oh! the best of all:

The little electric trains behind glass panes
Travelling across a cotton-snow Christmas land
From one tiny plastic village to another -
The Santa Fe Railway on tinplate tracks

A little boy’s dear dream for Christmas day
(But after an hour his parents drag him away)


Good-bye, Sears; thanks for the childhood memories.

If We Respected Work... - poem

Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com

If We Respected Work...

We would

Ask a receptionist for her autograph
Gather in thousands in awe of linemen
Practice the carpenter’s hammer at home
Invite a mechanic to the White House

We would

Order as a keepsake a plumber’s last pipe
Post pictures of teachers writing lesson plans
Make recordings of a wise plowman’s words
Publish biographies of waitresses

We would

Envy the garbageman aboard his yacht
And the workers’ lifestyle that we know not

"Human Eyeball Parts Grown in Lab" - poem

Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com

“Human Eyeball Parts Grown in Lab”

-Drudge

What do you look for in an eyeball lab-grown
While maybe it is looking back at you
And if you are looking for an eyeball
What are you looking for an eyeball with?

Will we have eyeballs grown for occasions -
A lovely blue for a day at the beach
And a stunning black for the opera
And Harris-tweed brown for a country weekend

But maybe lab eyeballs are just a rumor
A corn-ea attempt at vitreous humor!

When Robert Frost was Invited to the White House - poem

Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com

When Robert Frost was Invited to the White House

When Robert Frost visited President Kennedy
They spoke of poetry and power, of man
Of greatness and of God, of man’s swagger
Of poetry saving power from itself

When Robert Frost visited President Kennedy
They spoke of the poet’s responsibility
The duties of good men to other men
Of magnanimity and liberation

When Robert Frost visited President Kennedy
We lived a golden age in those few hours

A Toe Fungus Good Morning - poem

Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com

A Toe Fungus Good Morning

A yawning dawning clinging to the coffee cup
Dishwasher safe for your happy little home
You press the button for the magic screen
And the in-box presents - a toe fungus cure

Huh?

You opened the mail hoping for happiness
An existential why to the sleepless night
Matins and Lauds now electronical
And a note from a dear friend far away

But with your first sip of coffee, what did you see?
An ad for a toe fungus remedy!