Lawrence Hall, HSG
The Cold Kept Me in Today
The cold kept me in today
With a book, my dog, and the fire
The slanting sun, each mote-dusted ray –
It was all very like dear Tolkien’s Shire
Thursday, December 12, 2024
The Cold Kept Me in Today - short poem
Wednesday, December 11, 2024
I Met a Man in Saint Elizabeth's Hospital Parking Lot - poem
Lawrence Hall, HSG
I Met a Man in Saint Elizabeth’s Hospital Parking Lot
He looked at my brand-new knock-off
boonie hat
Pointed to himself, and said “1970”
He rattled on about “Come and Take
It” flags
And the “stupid mother******s” who
fly them
“The mother****ing VC wanted to do
that
And so I shot them d**n’ mother******s”
His wife was waiting for him,
impatiently
Sadly, sadly, heard-it-all-before-ly
For he had been no closer to Viet-Nam
Than to some John Wayne movie
Monday, December 9, 2024
The Holy Eucharist and Then Apple Butter - short poem
Lawrence Hall, HSG
The Holy Eucharist and Then Apple Butter
Church is where someone you don’t even know
Gives you a jar of homemade apple butter
And wishes you a happy Christmas
Sunday, December 8, 2024
Somewhere in Syria There is a You - poem
Lawrence Hall, HSG
Somewhere in Syria
There is a You
Somewhere in Syria there is a you
Pondering all the existential questions:
What is the meaning of life? Is God real?
Can you get to your job without getting shot?
Your notebooks were hidden from the old regime
Your notebooks are now hidden from the new
Is there enough food for today, for tomorrow -
Rough men with guns are beating on your door
Somewhere in Syria there is a you
In the next few seconds – what will you do?
Saturday, December 7, 2024
The Bond Girls are Grannies Now - poem
Lawrence Hall, HSG
The Bond Girls are
Grannies Now
James Bond’s girlfriends are mostly grannies now
Sweatpants and sneaks instead of bikinis
The school run with the grandchildren, the grocery store
Volunteering at the public library
If one of them mentions she once kissed Roger Moore
No one knows who he was – the Lone Ranger, maybe?
Adolescent hippie-color fantasies
Budgeting for the grandchildren’s new shoes
Didn’t you used to be somebody?
Well, yes, and you?
The United States Postal Service is Holding my Mail Hostage in Exchange for my Credit Card Number
Lawrence Hall, HSG
The United States
Postal Service is Holding my Mail Hostage
in Exchange for my
Credit Card Number
The Postal Service claims that my zip code is not my zip
code
They want confirmation and three cents to redeliver
They want my credit card number for those three cents
As if anyone can trust the USPS
They can’t even get mail delivery right:
They place other people’s letters in my mailbox
And the packages I receive have often been penetrated
By busy little postal workers’ hands
And for this they want my credit card
As the old cliché says, what could possibly go wrong?
Thursday, December 5, 2024
Show Me Who You Read - Poem
Lawrence Hall, HSG
Show Me Who You Read
Show me who you read
You love Thoreau’s hut on Walden Pond
You fly with Wendy and Peter to Neverland
You pet Mary Oliver’s marvelous dogs
And tell Yevtushenko not to be so full of himself
Show me who you read
You stand at an angle with Cavafy
You ask Frankl how he found meaning after all
You gaze into Tolkien’s palantir
And at bedtime say good night to the moon
Show me who you read
But I already know
You read by the light of a dreaming star
And everyone loves the starlight you are
The French Government Collapses - a wheeze
Lawrence Hall, HSG
The French
Government Collapses
4 December 2024
How can a government possibly collapse -
Did the National Assembly suffer a fainting spell?
Did the cabinet consume poisoned croissants
Or discover they’d been deceived by a California wine?
Perhaps a statue of Saint Joan of Arc
Newly gowned in haute couture from Wal-Mart
Lies prostrate in the Champs Elysee
Next to a made-in-China guillotine
How can a government have worked all in vain –
Did everyone in office go in Seine?
Tuesday, December 3, 2024
Old Mr. 'Possum and the Moon - poem
Lawrence Hall, HSG
Old Mr. ‘Possum and the Moon
Old Mr. ‘Possum is a garbageman
Who quietly works his appointed nightly rounds
Unappreciated as he tidies this
And cleans up that, all without any fuss
The other animals don’t seem to like him much
For his wobbling, waddling walk, his untidiness
His pointy nose, his all-draggledy tail
And his awkward shape like a loaf of oaf
But when he lifts his eyes to the queen of the skies
He knows that to her he is a knight in disguise
Another Argument Against the Death Penalty - short poem
Lawrence
Hall, HSG
Another Argument Against the Death
Penalty
Each one of
us is a murderer
To someone
else whose memory is long
Sunday, December 1, 2024
Ordinary Time and Advent: as a Diptych or a Dipstick or Something
Lawrence Hall, HSG
Ordinary Time and Advent: as a Diptych or a Dipstick or Something
I. The Last Day in Ordinary Time
Time is not at all ordinary, of course
It is an ordinal of flowing days
Whose current in its journey swims among
The well-marked seasons of sacred observances
Advent into and through Christmas and its promise
Lent into and through Easter and its fulfillment
Cycles of seasons, penance, and merry feasts
Each as a step in the great dance of Creation
All seasons echo God’s eternal rhyme
Blessing our senses with His created time
II. This is When You Light That First Candle Against Darkness
Ordinary Time is now as summer’s lost leaves
Autumn has fallen into fogs and frosts
Pale sunshine flickers from shallow angles all day
Marking out the road to Bethlehem
Before the Altar in the parish church
A wreath is set with four candles to light
The first one today and a second next week
A third, a fourth, and then at last the Stable
The Stable at last, where the universe sings
The happy Desire of all our wanderings
Friday, November 29, 2024
A Parliament Approves of Death for Christmas - rhyming doggerel
Lawrence Hall, HSG
A Parliamentary
Validation of Guy Fawkes
The death-penalty ban has been reversed
But will members of Parliament want to go first?
Wednesday, November 27, 2024
The Mostest Magicalist Familiestest Christmas Ever - poem
Lawrence Hall, HSG
The Mostest Magicalist Familiestest Christmas Ever
She will make this the most magical family Christmas ever
With the perfect tree
The perfect gifts
The perfect table
The perfect meal
The perfect ambience
The perfect decorations
A memory worthy of inclusion in a Hallmark movie
She will make this the most magical family Christmas ever
No matter how many children she reduces to tears for it
Sunday, November 24, 2024
Algebra is not in the Bible - poem
Lawrence Hall, HSG
Algebra is not in
the Bible
Jesus never said unto us, “Solve for X”
If algebra were real, the apostolic succession
Of bishops would have told us about it
(After 2,000 years of committee meetings)
I miss Bob Newhart
Saturday, November 23, 2024
You are Civilization's Quiet Contemplative - poem
Lawrence Hall, HSG
You are Civilization’s Quiet Contemplative
I send Love’s name into the world with wings
-Thomas Merton, “A Psalm”
Into your pocket you slip a volume of verse
To feel and smell and breathe the words of others
And paper and pen are ready to your hand
To limn an errant dream as it whispers by
You take a roadside turning known only to you
Recusing yourself from busy-ness for awhile
To sigh upon a grassy bank and simply be
And rescue civilization from itself
With words you embrace the entirety of life
(But don’t forget your British Army Knife)
Still Listening to the Warm - poem
Lawrence Hall, HSG
Still Listening to
the Warm
Rod McKuen was the coolest of the cool
And now he’s not
Which makes him warmer than ever
On the pencil-marked pages of our youth
“Listen to the Warm” is still good advice
Thursday, November 21, 2024
Politics and the Public Square - poem
Lawrence Hall, HSG
Politics and the Public Square
Oh, yes, we know about the public square -
That’s where the Enlightenment works the guillotine
That’s where sensitive progressives murder Jews
And constitutionalists rubbish the Constitution
Oh, yes, we know about the public square -
That’s where those who kiss dictators deny the King
That’s where individualists join in mobs
And the last few children are hunted down and killed
Oh, yes, we know about the public square –
Where the screams of the dying poison the air
Wednesday, November 20, 2024
I'm Gonna Tell Santa Claus on You! - poem
Lawrence Hall, HSG
I’m Gonna Tell
Santa Claus on You!
Nora and Theo
The children scamper across my grassy lawn
And bring me wiggly worms to identify
Big acorns to admire, lemons fallen weeks before
Sticks and leaves, pinecones, flowers, and bits of bark
They lose their shoes and socks beneath the oak
They drink from the water hose and don’t turn it off
They chase the dog and the dog chases them
They shriek out joyfully because they can
I growl that if I mow another bit of brick
I’m gonna tell ol’ Santa Claus on them
They laugh at me, and bring me another worm
When She Sold Her Old Ford Mustang - poem
Lawrence Hall, HSG
When She Sold Her Old Ford Mustang
Y’all need some more coffee? I got some fresh
That car was my dream; had it since I was twenty
When I got married it was our honeymoon ride
When I got divorced it was all I had
After me and my baby got away from the beatings
Your breakfast okay? We got a new cook
We sometimes had to live in it, y’know?
So like I had to tell my son I’m selling it
I promised it to him for his graduation
That car was our life. But it ain’t safe
Did I tell you we got a new cook? He’s pretty good
I’m been waitin’ tables in this old café for years
Watchin’ the world go by on th’ highway
Schrodinger's Turtle - rhyming doggerel
Lawrence Hall, HSG
Schrodinger’s Turtle
Don’t let a quantum mechanic work on your car
A cat on a fence post probably got there himself
And may be observed to be alive or dead
A turtle in a box is not on a shelf
“And I don’t know why,” the scientist said
“Meow,” the poor little cat cried out in dread
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