A Sir Philip Sidney Moment with a Rubbish Bin, but not a Red Rubbish Bin - poem

  

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

A Sir Philip Sidney Moment

 

With a Rubbish Bin, but not a Red Rubbish Bin

 

After the passing of afternoon storms

A quiet moment of reflection at dusk

Our Lady Moon shone high above the trees

Sailing among the last sun-glowing clouds

 

I addressed the Moon as the goddess she is

Speaking of dreams, and asked her to pray for me

But suddenly she danced behind the mist

In playful teasing, or in stern disapproval

 

Perhaps one should not address our Lady Moon

While rolling household garbage to the end of the lane

 

 

Sir Philip Sidney, “Astrophel and Stella 31”

William Carlos Williams, “The Red Wheelbarrow”

Where are the Frogs of Spring? - poem

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

Where are the Frogs of Spring?

 

-as John Keats never said

 

Ay, where are they? This October is summer-sour

And drowsy frogs are singing out for rain

Croakery-croaking sadly by the hour

Invoking God for a shower, but still in vain

 

The grass is withered and sere, the ground is dust

Bees gather ‘round each desiccated bloom

Seeking nectar but finding only crust

For their colony-hive on the cusp of doom

 

Where are the rains of October, then –

And the frosts? Ay, where are they? Where, and when?

We Need to Talk - poem

  

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

We Need to Talk

 

When a woman says, “we need to talk”

A man’s complexion pales; he begins to sweat

His spine of stern chilled steel becomes chilled mush

As he examines his conscience in anticipation of doom

 

Her talk will not be of puppies or cups of tea

Or how the flowers are bedded in for autumn

Of the curious news from the Bering Strait

Nor yet of ships or sealing wax or kings

 

Oh, no – “we need to talk” means that he will be silent

As she posts to the docket his most recent crimes

 

Line 8 – cf. Lewis, Carroll, “The Walrus and the Carpenter”

How Many Languages of Happiness Do You Speak? - poem

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

How Many Languages of Happiness Do You Speak?

 

In how many languages, then, do you

Sing

Sigh

Whisper

 

Breathe

Work

Love

Dream

 

Hope

Laugh

Comfort

And sometimes chide

 

I want to hear all of them from you

(Except maybe the chide)

 

Oop! I Forgot to Attend the Revolution - poem

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

Oops - I Forgot to Attend the Revolution

 

From an idea by Scarlet

 

You haven’t yet received your check from George?

I would have thought that his Dark Web of Power

Would have been more efficient than that

But getting good spies is so difficult these days

 

Did I mention that he was by the house on Friday?

We sat on the lawn with drinks and cigars

Counting the autumn fireflies flickering at dusk

I guess his plan for world domination slipped his mind

 

As for me, I simply forgot to attend the Revolution -

I was distracted by the adorable new kittens

Louvre Robbed in Broad Daylight - a question

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

“Louvre Robbed in Broad Daylight”

 

-news item

 

One wonders if there is any narrow daylight.

A Classmate’s Noisy Little Sister - poem

  

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

A Classmate’s Noisy Little Sister

 

 

"The old order changeth, yielding place to new,

And God fulfils Himself in many ways…”

 

-Tennyson, Idylls of the King

 

When she was a child

 

An assignment in one of her high school classes

Was to write to one of Our Brave Boys somewhere

Section 8 of Article I was being ignored

And she chose me, which made me feel special

 

Which is irrelevant; her funeral is tomorrow

Her son, a fine young man, cried as he hugged me

A father himself, a citizen of dignity and honor

For the moment a little boy who couldn’t find his mom

 

As her family assembled to pray her farewell

 

She did good

 

And so may you

 

And so may we all

DO NOT TAKE PICTURES OF THE TRANSPARENT DESTRUCTION! - poem (of a sort)

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

DO NOT TAKE PICTURES OF THE TRANSPARENT DESTRUCTION!

 

 

Macbeth to the witches:

 

How now, you secret, black, and midnight hags.

What is't you do?

 

Witches:                        

 

                                     A deed without a name.

 

-Macbeth IV.i.48-50

 

Bricks, freedom, columns, windows that let in light, old trees that shaded the lawns, dignity, decency, mercy, kindness, self-discipline, honor, precedents ancient and modern, protections, chapters and verses, the majesty of the law, literature, music, art, dining with utensils, logic, education, good taste – all must go DO NOT TAKE PICTURES

 

 

 

Wreckers guide steel treads

                                                       DO NOT TAKE PICTURES         Over fragments of Amendment V

Trenchers rip the

                             heart  DO NOT TAKE PICTURES     out of Amendment IV

 

Excavators heave Amendment XXII

                                                DO NOT TAKE PICTURES

                                                                              into garbage skips

 

Cranes stack bits of Amendment VI against a chain link fence

 

DO NOT TAKE PICTURES

 

And at dusk a fire, a big, beautiful fire, chantings and clenched fists while tokens of the freedom to disagree, freedom from a government religion, freedom to choose one’s own books, and freedom from fear rise as flame and fire and smoke, and The People wave their made-in-China gift-shop bibles with the words of Our Leader printed in red and sing along to the musical stylings of Horst Wessel.

 

BUT DO NOT TAKE PICTURES

You are the Poet and the Poem - poem

  

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

You are the Poet and the Poem

 

You are the poem and the poet

Without you the sun could not rise

Bringing light for the flowers

And warmth to bless this happy land

"There's Husbandry in Heaven" - poem

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

“There’s Husbandry in Heaven”

 

 

“…There’s husbandry in heaven;

Their candles are all out...”

 

-Macbeth II.i.6-7

 

 

Good folk will tend to see the good in all -

When Banquo was aware of the starless night

He saw in that not a lack of light 

But rather the careful conservation of light

 

And so we see this night, this rainy night

Not as a time of cold and darkness and damp

But an occasion for hearth-gathering the family

For cards, chess, read-alouds, blankies, warmth, peace

 

Good folk will tend to see the good in all

And good must then on all of us befall

Who is My Favorite Hero? - poem

  

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

Who is My Favorite Hero?

 

Do you now, or have you ever…

 

Worked double shifts or double jobs to pay the bills

Read to your children instead of yelling at them

Had to jump-start your car in the pre-dawn cold

Jump-started your neighbor’s car in the pre-dawn cold

 

Do you now, or have you ever…

 

Done some hard time in the military

Served in the volunteer fire department

Attended divine services without making a fuss

Milked cows, chopped wood, raised a garden

 

Do you now, or have you ever…

 

Know which end of a hammer hits the nail

Built a home library for your children and yourself

Set a daily study schedule for developing your mind

Raised your children after your spouse bugged out

 

Do you now, or have you ever…

 

Gone to work zero-dark-early and stayed there late

And did more than was expected of you

Taken your children on nature works

Volunteered at your local hospital

 

Of course you have

 

So who is my favorite hero?

 

You are

Stop Running - poem

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

Stop Running

 

1 Kings 19

 

Stop searching. Hold still

Rest now under a broom tree

And He will find you

About Your Poem - poem

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

About Your Poem

 

If you send a poem, and only one or two read it

And no one ticks a box or writes a response

Then have you worked a positive good into the world?

Oh, yes!

 

For you have written a verse upon a page

Upon a leaf that sails upon the air

Upon wild solar winds and to the stars

To where

 

A Voice reads it as a love letter to all

Who are so very blessed in knowing you

Macbeth Will Have No Say About It - poem

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

Macbeth Will Have No Say About It

 

 

                       Light thickens; and the crow
Makes wing to the rooky wood:
Good things of day begin to droop and drowse

 

-Macbeth III.ii.50-52

 

 

Finishing the chores as the evening light fails

And high above me in the paling blue

Three crows calling out harshly as they soar

Indeed making wing to a rooky wood

 

Good things of day, good animals, in peace

Are safely penned in their barns and byres

And we marvel at god’s kindness in all things

A warm fire, lanternlight, supper, blessings

 

Let us hear nothing of the tyrant’s foul plans

But instead, happy stories, Evensong, then sleep

About NO KINGS DAY - doggerel

  

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

About NO KINGS DAY

 

 

“The King’s under the law, for it’s the law that makes him a King.”

 

― C.S. Lewis, The Horse and His Boy

 

Thus we need not worry about such a thing

As our proud president wanting to be a king

The Ruby-Throated Grand Scheme of Things - poem

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

 

The Ruby-Throated Grand Scheme of Things

 

The last hummingbird of the season, perhaps,

A tail-end Charlie, this mid-October pilgrim

Stopping a moment at the dollar-store feeder

On El Camino Real to Mexico

 

To what king will this royal messenger report?

His legions of the air and summer flowers

Are gathering in from all over the Americas

To winter in mysterious valleys and hidden fields

 

 

L’envoi:

 

We can’t know where your long journey will end

But God speed you as you fly with the wind, little friend

Dawn Across the Planet - short poem

 Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

Dawn Across the Planet

 

Soon you will be awake for breakfast and tea

A good cup of tea for beginning the day

As the waning Harvest Moon sails west

And you and the sun rise happily in the east

Forgive Me for not Writing Yesterday - poem

  

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

Forgive Me for not Writing Yesterday

 

I was reclined before a bin of farriers’ tools

Ironmongery smithied in shining steel

In a room shaded institutional green

Fluorescent lights, only one door

 

Gadgets clipped to me, needles poked into me

Surely soon would sound the voice of Number Two:

“Information. We want information.”

Thinking of pain, then poetry, then you

 

But having a dying tooth extracted

Does not lend itself to metre or rhyme!

She Thinks My Tractor's Schleppy - poem

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

She Thinks My Tractor’s Schleppy

 

Anyone who can hear “She thinks my tractor’s sexy”

With a teary eye of sentimentality

For a lost golden age of rural life

 

Da*ned sure didn't grow up on a farm

 

 

 

Cf. Kenny Chesney, “She Thinks My Tractor's Sexy,” lyrics by Jim Collins and Paul Overstreet.

Kind Hearts are More Than Coronets - rhyming doggerel

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

“Kind Hearts are More Than Coronets”

 

Tennyson – “Lady Clare Vere de Vere”

 

But coronets will get you set

In better seats at Goodwood, you bet

(Doesn't everyone read Tennyson on Sunday afternoon?)

Saint Vincent Ferrer and I Go Fishing in a Toilet Tank - weak doggerel

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

Saint Vincent Ferrer and I Go Fishing in a Toilet Tank

 

 

And the master-salesman asked of him and me:

Is the flapper-valve, yea, verily, two inches or three?

 

-not exactly according to Ultimate Guide: Plumbing, Creative Homeowner, 2021

 

 

Toilet bowls are fascinating to dogs and cats

Like watering holes on the Serengeti plains

Their cousins hunt among the desert flats

In the seasons between sweet nourishing rains

 

Strange noises in the dark…

 

But when the water gushes both day and night

St. Vincent and I must pray and think and work

To work this ceramic water-hole aright

For Luna and Pushkin to hunt and lurk

 

The animals watch impatiently…

 

Our labors at last are proven to be blest

As water flows like a smooth anapest!

A Sidewalk Table at Pouline's - poem

  

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

A Sidewalk Table at Pouline’s

 

V: Monsieur…

 

R:                     Oui?

 

V:                              Your life has no meaning

 

Please let it have no meaning somewhere else

 

R: But my coffee, my croissant…

 

V:                                                    Oui, you have paid

 

And have left the perfect tip. The afternoon

 

Is slow and there are certainly plenty of tables

 

Your appearance and demeanor are parfait but…”

 

R: Oui?

 

V:             You have sat here ten minutes into the time

 

At which you commenced to appear desperate.

 

R: But how?

 

V:                If you must ask then you are desperate

You have not been accepted into the mysteries

And never can be. You have been caught out

Please dispose of your Mont Blanc pen

 

Your embossed note cards, your important papers,

And your leather portfolio crafted in understated elegance,

And go deliver groceries or wash cars.

 

R: Does it really show?

 

V:                It’s as if you

Were taking a selfie

At Shakespeare & Co

 

R: Then all is existential despair

 

V:                Oui, former monsieur

Tell Me About Your Day - poem

 

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

 

Tell Me About Your Day

 

The evening air is cool – let’s sit outside in the dusk

Tell me about your day, your work, your friends

I like your friends; they write such lovely verse -

Nothing as nearly good as yours, of course!

 

The evening air is cool

 

I enjoyed breakfast with my friends, our weekly outing

We talked of our children and our hopes for them

Later I worked at chores in the garden and house

And read new lines from my favorite poet

 

The evening air is cool

 

I so enjoy talking with you – do I talk too much?

Too little? Just right? You are such fun to listen to!

 

And the evening air is just right