Dispatches for the Colonial Office

LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love

An Elderly Woman Screaming Obscenities into her MePhone

in the Parking Lot of Saint Elizabeth’s Hospital

“Where the **** are you!? Did you sneak away!?”

Might serve as an existential question

Addressed to a patient saint, to God

To the silent spheres of Creation

“What is this ****!? Did you ****ing leave me here!?”

We’ve all asked that question: in a lonely bed

On a blood-sodden gurney in an emergency room

In the screaming-burning-gunfire streets

With the courage and compassion which befits a man

I slipped around her rage, and avoided her eyes

Monday, October 12, 2026

"The Man with the Spanish Helmet" on the Barracks Wall - poem

Lawrence Hall

LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love

“The Man with the Spanish Helmet” on the Barracks Wall

Hospital Corps Barracks, Naval Hospital San Diego,

ca. January 1970

A barracks wall is a studio wall:

Miss April, smokin’ hot sin on a dead bear’s skin

Miss October, tall (in need of a shawl)

Miss January, thin, an aethereal djinn

But among these beauties (grandmothers now)

A Spanish helmet and a stern old man

A white-haired don still strong in chin and brow

Like yours, his eyes for truth and wisdom scan

So then who wears that dreamer’s helmet? Who?

Why, the Dreamer with the Spanish Helmet is

you

Variant ending:

“The Man with the Spanish Helmet” on a Barracks Wall

Hospital Corps Barracks, Naval Hospital San Diego,

ca. January 1970

A barracks wall is a studio wall:

Miss April, smokin’ hot sin on a dead bear’s skin

Miss October, tall (in need of a shawl)

Miss January, thin, an aethereal djinn

But among these beauties (grandmothers now)

A Spanish helmet and a stern old man

A white-haired don still strong in chin and brow

Like yours, his eyes for truth and wisdom scan

So then who wears that dreamer’s helmet? Who?

And why is he looking not at me but at

you?

Sunday, October 11, 2026

Do ICE Agents Teach Sunday School? - derivative doggerel

Lawrence Hall

LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love

Do ICE Agents Teach Sunday School?

A furore monstrorum glaciei libera nos Domine

Now I lay me down to sleep

But in the night the ICEmen creep

I cannot sleep; I’m still awake -

I fear the ICEmen will come and take…

Friday, October 9, 2026

We are All Pretty Much Exiles, You Know - poem

Lawrence Hall

LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love

We are All Pretty Much Exiles, You Know

We are all pretty much exiles, you know

We scribble verse to reconstruct our home

That half-remembered never-seen mystery

Within our hearts, sailing beyond the stars

Half-worlds threading from chewed-yellow-pencil leads

The sharpener says, “Now this may sting a little”

As cedar spirals down to the kitchen floor

Poor pairs of rhymes that never find each other

They’ve gone and closed the Main Street picture show

We are all pretty much exiles, you know

While Repairing a Widder-Woman's Door Locks - a poor senryu

Lawrence Hall

LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love

While Repairing a Widder-Woman’s Door Locks

A widder-woman

Drove her car (crash!) into mine

She doesn’t know why

A Certain Ancestor - poem

Lawrence Hall

LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love

A Certain Ancestor

Yes, sir,

When God made him

God broke the mold

Most angrily

Hugo Boss Swastikas Have Been Replaced - poem

Lawrence Hall

LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love