Upon Reading – LogoSophia Magazine
A small collection of recent poems published in LogoSophia (the editor makes even my poor work look good!).
Wednesday, October 19, 2022
Gender Selection is not Addressed in THE OXFORD BOOK OF ENGLISH VERSE ("Q" - not that "Q" - 1940 printing) - poem
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
Gender
Selection is not Addressed in The Oxford Book of English Verse
That was the time when the custom of political
re-education
of teachers by students had
come in.
-Doctor Zhivago, epilogue
Once upon a time a likeable
student said
“You know, Mr. Hall, you can
choose your gender now”
I paused, then replied, “And you
know that’s impossible”
He was silent, folding his arms
in contempt
I had been investigated before
And expected a summons from the
Colonial Office
With a list of sensitive points to
be addressed
But I hadn’t been reported this
time
Someday, when this old world is
set aright
Some will say such things could
not have happened
In America
Monday, October 17, 2022
Lest Our Old Shoes Sit Easier Than Our New - poem
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
Lest
Our Old Shoes Sit Easier Than Our New
-as Macduff does not say in Macbeth
When we were children we were
proud of our new shoes
Our once-a-year shoes in
situational poverty
Although we went barefootin’
most of the time
As long as the weather and parents
allowed
But we had to wear them to Sunday
church
And finally to school after the
first chill
But it was something to own a
new pair of shoes
To stand upon the earth in
feigned prosperity
And even now, with lots of pairs
to choose
We want to ask folks if they
like our new shoes
Sunday, October 16, 2022
Taking Time to Stomp the Flowers - weekly column, 16 October 2022
Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com
Taking Time to
Stomp the Flowers
At London’s National Gallery last week two unhappy young
persons, one styling herself “Ziggy Stardyke,” vandalized one of Van Gogh’s
sunflower paintings by sloshing it with tomato soup. Both were costumed in tee-shirts proclaiming,
“JUST STOP OIL.” The purple-haired Miss Ziggy then yelled, “What is worth more,
art or life? Is it worth more than food?”
The art was on the wall, and then the food was too; Miss
Ziggy and her sullen comrade are the ones lacking a life.
Another reality is that the possibility of you or I having
an intelligent, source-based give-and-take exchange of ideas with someone
styling herself Ziggy Stardyke is remote.
Two topics obtain in the recent adventures of Ziggy
Stardyke and her sour-faced little Renfield. The first one is the matter of
fossil fuels, including oil, coal, and natural gas. Without these sources of energy we would all
be dead. There is not enough wood on the planet to replace them, and solar and
wind are still laboratory projects. Nuclear, which would also work, is mostly
forbidden because some lazybones at Three Mile Island chose to ignore the layers
of warnings and then the safety protocols.
The other topic is civilization. To paraphrase a character in an episode of Northern
Exposure, we are not monkeys with car keys. We are humans, sons and
daughters of Adam and Eve, as C. S. Lewis reminds us. We think. We build. We
speak. We write. We draw. We paint. We sculpt. We identify and solve problems. We
recognize Creation and our part in it. We deal with the complexities of
creation through science, math, art, and poetry. As the Greek philosophers
teach us, life is about questing for the good, the true, and the beautiful.
Any utilitarian structure confirms this: a bridge over,
say, the Houston Ship Channel is good because it provides enhanced freedom of
movement and the exchange of goods and services for people going about the
business of life. A bridge is also true because its engineering and
construction work together in physical harmony through the applications of
engineering, geometry, metallurgy, hydrology, and the other sciences. Finally,
a bridge is beautiful because its functions and proportions personify the human
spirit. The suspension cables, the towers of steel, and all of the works of
human minds and hands that make a bridge a bridge are aesthetically pleasing.
Ziggy Stardyke and her Renfield have looked upon the
good, the true, and the beautiful, upon at least 10,000 years of civilization,
and have found them wanting. Therefore, exactly like Nazis, Communists, Talibannies,
and some of their own English ancestors [Puritan Iconoclasm in the
English Civil War | Reviews in History], they censor them. They who have
life only because of the wise use of fossil fuels condemn the use of fossil
fuels, and express their condemnation by censorship, by attempting to destroy a
work of art, one of Van Gogh’s sunflower paintings, which has no connection
with fossil fuels except that we would need to take a London Transport bus to go
see it.
These two childish individuals are purportedly educated
women, but so far have demonstrated no knowledge of either the sciences or the fuzzy
studies, and in their invincible puerile ignorance angrily destroy things of
beauty while shrieking illogical demands at the rest us.
In the autumn of 1945 the Western world surely did not
imagine that civilization would fall again into book banning, book burning, the
censorship of movies, newspapers, and broadcasts, the destruction of art, and
mobs chanting slogans of hate in the streets, but here we are.
A sunflower is heliocentric – it turns to the light. Poor
Ziggy Stardyke and her Grima Wormtongue turn to the darkness.
-30-
Like an Autopsy on a Dear Friend - poem
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
Like
an Autopsy on a Dear Friend
I’m amputating limbs in late
October heat
Grateful to this friend who gave
me so much:
Those first green leaves and
blossoms in the spring
Deeper greens through summer,
and apples in season
Something went wrong in the
winter, and she didn’t awaken
The summer passed with its more
pressing chores
And only now can I cut my friend
apart
Into sweet billets for the
winter fires
She will be with me this
Christmas in comforting flame
And then return to Creation,
from whence she came
Saturday, October 15, 2022
Reported Side Effects Include... - poem
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
Reported
Side Effects Include…
After a dose a sudden nap-attack
A sour afternoon of sour
dreamful sleep
Unhappy sour imaginings among
sour pains
Feverishly sour and dizzily sour
Feverishly up and dizzily up
To watch the feverishly sour
news
Sour Putin parked nuclear
bombers in my head
Is Nancy really threatening to
punch Donald?
Sour!
I’ll verify with Lester Holt
tomorrow
For now I’m clinging to my sour
sorrow
Friday, October 14, 2022
Casualties of Being - poem
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
Casualties
of Being
In the last century
I lost my youth in Viet-Nam
Last week I met a man
Who lost his son last year
Autumn - always autumn
Thursday, October 13, 2022
My New Shoes Might Test Positive for Traces of Blood - poem
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
My
New Shoes Might Test Positive for Traces of Blood
Brand-name boat shoes glued
together in gloom
Canvas and rubber and toxicity from
Shanghai
Bloody little hands and decaying
lungs:
We are all guilty of slavery
Do the workers dream of
luxurious yachts
Or even a day off for a picnic
at the pond
Bloody little hands and decaying
lungs:
We are all guilty of slavery
Bloody little hands and decaying
lungs:
We are all guilty of slavery
Wednesday, October 12, 2022
A Geriatric Motorcycle Gang Invades the Bluebonnet Cafe' - poem
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
A
Geriatric Motorcycle Gang Invades the Bluebonnet Café
The Hearing Aids from Hell Roaring
off the Screen
Biker Babushkas High on Geritol
Looking for Trouble and a Clean
Restroom
The Wild One Searching for his lost
Social Security
Hell’s Angels on Aluminum Walkers
The Thundering Electra Glide in
Blue Rinse
Harley Davidson and the COPD
Inhaler Man
Dentures Every Which Way and
Loose
“What are you rebelling
against?”
“What have…wait…it’s coming to
me…what have you…dang, I forgot!”
Tuesday, October 11, 2022
Mention Stalin in Your Poem - a poem, but "Stalin" is mentioned only in the title
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
Mention
Stalin in Your Poem
“It was discovered that there was not one mention of Stalin
in your poem…”
-Yevtushenko, A Precocious Autobiography, p. 67
A chill October morning of
brilliant air
Leaves turning in their colors
and on their stems
In the healing-cool Cerean
breeze
As the goddess takes her dreamy
walk
This bright October morning of
happiness
It’s time to put the garden
tools away
Summer, in need of healing,
begins to rest
Each moment is an earth-crafted waykreuz
But to approved poets this
morning is nothing
For it makes no mention of
anti-colonialism
Monday, October 10, 2022
I Never Want to Hear a Child Made to Sing Cohen's "Hallelujah" Ever Again poem
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
I
Never Want to Hear a Child Made to Sing Cohen’s “Hallelujah” Ever Again
Our first contestant will sing
“Hallelujah”
After taking ten minutes for
exposition
About what it meant to her
granny
And she knows Granny’s in Heaven
listening
Audience, you are obligated to
cry
Our next
contestant will sing “Hallelujah”
After
taking ten minutes for exposition
About
what it meant to his ol’ pop
And
he knows Pop’s in Heaven listening
Audience,
you are obligated to cry
Our
third contestant will sing “Hallelujah”
After
taking ten minutes for exposition
About
what it meant to her cat Fluffy
And
she knows Fluffy’s in Heaven listening
Audience,
you are obligated to cry
Our fourth contestant will sing
“Hallelujah”
After taking ten minutes for
exposition
About what it meant to his big
brother
And he knows his brother is in
Heaven listening
Audience, you are obligated to
cry
And the winner is…“Hallelujah!”
And in each listener there is a
secret cry:
“Cohen, why are you doing this
to us!”
Sunday, October 9, 2022
A Very Brief Review of WHEN BOOKS WENT TO WAR - weekly column, 9 October 2022
Lawrence Hall, HSG
A Very Brief Review
of When Books Went to War
When
America entered World War II in 1941, we faced an enemy that had banned and
burned more than 100 million books and caused fearful citizens to hide…many
more.
-Cover note, When Books Went to War, by Molly Guptill
Manning
The “we” is a bit precious; the blurb writer was not in
World War II, nor was the author, nor I, nor you. Still, the point is well
made: tyrants don’t want people thinking for themselves. Books are dangerous to
bullies, whether they are Hitler, Stalin, Ho Chi Minh, Vlad the Bad Putin, Chairman
Xi, or the Ms. Grundy down the street.
Molly Guptill Manning’s excellent When Books Went to War
begins with an overview of what books have been accessible to soldiers, beginning
with the American Civil War, and then examines censorship of all media but especially
books in the Nazi time.
When American entered the war the average education level
among soldiers was the 11th grade, which was the highest in U.S.
military history. With an almost universal literacy rate, books would be important
for morale and for helping promote critical thinking and a sense of culture for
helping democratize learning among all Americans after the war.
The process of making books accessible was complicated, but
by 1943 the Armed Services Editions (ASE) of all sorts of books – fiction,
non-fiction, poetry, and scientific-technical - were being sent to our military
all over the world.
These paperback editions were designed to fit a combat
infantryman’s pockets, and were bound on the narrow edge rather than the wide. Given
that printing presses and paper sourced had to be modified for this format,
this was a challenge, but one successfully met.
Ironically, there were strong attempts to censor the content.
Title V, the Soldiers’ Voting Rights Act, was burdened with a rider that would
have banned any book with even a hint of politics. Although Title V was so botched
that very few soldiers overseas were permitted to vote, the censorship was
scrubbed. As The San Antonio News said, “One would think that the men
who fight the Nation’s battles would be quite able to decide for themselves what
they would like to read” (p. 142).
Miss Manning appends the titles and authors of the thousands
of ASEs. Many of these are action books: westerns (Hopalong Cassidy Serves a
Writ), detective stories (The Postman Always Rings Twice), historical
novels (Death Comes for the Archbishop), and a very few war narratives, along
with essays, science fiction, biographies, drama. There is a little poetry: Robert
Frost, for instance, Carl Sandburg, Whitman, Longfellow, and others, including Robert
Herrick, who would now be found only in a university graduate course. There is
a Russian novel written by a fellow named Kalashnikoff (as spelt) and German Erich
Maria Remarque’s Arch of Triumph.
The ASE’s would in fact represent the holdings of an
especially good library in a mid-sized American city or a very large high
school. That is, of course, before all
the Ms. Grundys thundered in looking for th’ dirty books.
…over
123 million Armed Services Editions were printed. The Victory Book Campaign added
18 million donated books to the total number distributed to American troops.
More books were given to the American armed services than Hitler destroyed (p.
194).
Those free and uncensored books were examples of the many
things this nation gets exactly right. Thanks to Molly Guptill Manning for
reminding us.
-30-
A Mansie Wearing a Gun in the Supermarket - doggerel
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
A Mansie Wearing a Gun in the Supermarket
Wearin’ a big iron on his hip he
swaggers down the aisle
The village idiot over by the
vegetables
When you call him that, tomato,
smile
He ain’t takin’ no lip from any
of you edibles
Wearin’ a big iron on his hip he
faces down
A mob of gluten-free breads carrying
torches and a rope
Looking for back-shootin’ rice,
white or brown
Who want rough justice for a
cantaloupe
Step easy when he’s around,
potato chip
That anal orifice with a big
iron on his hip
Saturday, October 8, 2022
People of The Book and of Books
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
People
of The Book and of Books
The Thought became Incarnate in
Judaea
And thoughts become incarnate in
the books we read
For thoughts are tabernacles of
our hopes
Tents in the deserts of our
wanderings
Our dreams worked out in careful
lines of ink
Tippy-tap-typed on a computer
screen
Or copied from those tablets in
the Sinai
Then bound by an artist’s hands,
and placed in ours
The Thought became Incarnate in
Judaea
Our thoughts become incarnate in
the books we write
Friday, October 7, 2022
An Airship in the Night - poem
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
An
Airship in the Night
Once upon a time they were ships
of the air
And rarely seen in our rural
skies
But I saw them in the picture
books
In a three-color process, ships
of dreams
And then I went to the Palace
Theatre
Where from the middle seat in
the very front row
I sailed over London in Captain
Hook’s ship
Navigating past Big Ben and
Saint Paul’s
Last night I saw a ship on the
Houston approach
Its navigation lights signaling
to dreamers
Thursday, October 6, 2022
Revenge is a Dish Best Served... -Senryu
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
Revenge
is a Dish Best Served…
Revenge is a dish
Best served warm from the oven
With mercy all ‘round
Wednesday, October 5, 2022
The Times They are not A-Changing - poem
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
The
Times They are not A-changing
Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in
-Thoreau
If the times they really are a-changing
Then they were never relevant,
nor can they be
Love is not measured with a fine
Martian watch
Nor do Sinai or Olympus count
the minutes
The dances of the planets need
no batteries
Galaxies do not bother with the
news
The Torah can never be outdated
(Nor can Bob, but that’s for
another not-time)
If the times they really are
a-changing
Then this moment with you can
have no meaning
Tuesday, October 4, 2022
No Bombers Over Our Lady Help of Christians Catholic School in 1958 - doggerel
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
No
Bombers Over Our Lady Help of Christians Catholic School in 1958:
A
Brief Discussion of a Successful Cold War Tactic
from an idea suggested by Kirk Briggs
Some have scoffed about hiding
under our tables
As protection from the Soviets’
nuclear strikes
But scorn not this truth of those
factual fables:
It worked! No bombers! Post that
as one of our “likes!”
Breakfast in Constantinople and Other Poems
Breakfast in Constantinople – LogoSophia Magazine
Another selection from LogoSophia, whose kind and thoughtful editor makes even my poor work look good!
Monday, October 3, 2022
Ridin' it Out - poem
Lawrence Hall
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
Ridin’
it Out
You see him on tv: “I’m ridin’
it out”
He sneers, “I been through lotsa
hurricanes
Ain’t never needed to leave, not
gonna now
I’m protectin’ my own; I know
what I’m doin’”
Ridin’ it out
You see the turtles eating the
man’s eyes first
They’re soft and delicious, a
scavenger’s treat
They’ve already eaten his
children’s eyes
Except for the little girl, taken
down by a ‘gator
Ridin’ it out
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)
