Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
A Br
A Bronze Plaque
Commemorating the Trump-Putin Summit
at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson
On this spot on the
15th of August 2025
Nothing happened
Saturday, August 16, 2025
A Bronze Plaque Commemorating the Trump-Putin Summit at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson
The Shroud of Turin is True Again Today! Or Maybe Not! - rhyming doggerel having a little fun with the U. K. DAILY MAIL
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
The Shroud of Turin is True Again Today! Or Maybe Not!
The ghost of Amelia Earhart speaks
The U.K. Daily Mail examined the Shroud of Turin
And found Amelia Earhart wrapped up inside:
“Hey! This is my shroud for private buryin’!
So don’t just stand there, all goofy and bug-eyed!”
“You keep changing the place where you found my plane
And yesterday you said the Shroud of Turin is bogus
Today you say it’s real – you babble in vain
The ghost of me wishes you would find a focus”
The U.K. Daily Mail found Amelia Earhart’s plane –
Tomorrow they’ll be sure to lose it again
Thursday, August 14, 2025
Our Little Universities - poem
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
Our Little Universities
From an idea by Nivek
Many books are little universities
Complete with faculties and study halls
Grassy lawns on which to argue ideas
Syllabi written from your heart and mind
Laboratories of the mind for distilling wisdom
A concert hall of happy voices in song
“Pomes All Sizes” spoken from the heart
And maybe a Rain Tree on your walk to class
The Brothers Karamazov as a prayer book
300 Tang Poems with the wisdom of China
The Oxford Book of English Verse, edited by Q
(Not THAT Q!)
Doctor Zhivago in squabbling translations
And some have spoken most eloquently
for Goodnight
Moon
And now what university of yours helps sing
the world in
tune?
Wednesday, August 13, 2025
Let’s All Meet in Cicely - sonnet
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
Let’s All Meet in Cicely
From an idea flown all the way from Thailand
Let’s all meet in Cicely before the snow
You can find me sitting outside The Brick
At peace as the gentle autumn breezes blow
Having put aside my hiking stick
Fleischmann joins us on that old wooden bench
Chris-in-the-Morning stops by for a beer
Hollings gives Shelly a husbandly pinch
She takes his broom and with it smacks his rear
Maurice and Maggie, Ruth-Anne, Marilyn, and Ed
Drop in with stories of love and life and history
And news brought in by plane and road and sled
To this Brigadoon of happy mystery
Let’s all meet in Cicely before the snow
And share in its peace before we go
Never Begin a Poem with “I” - poem
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
Never Begin a Poem
with “I”
I suppose I have been commanded to write
These fragile words in attempted iambs
Which few will ever read or ever want to read
But then – you are reading them
Thank
you
You’ve Read Your Last Free Article - not exactly a poem
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
You’ve Read Your Last Free Article
Yes, I have.
(Click. Delete.)
Monday, August 11, 2025
Leave It To Beaver - The Shakespearean I.C.E. Episode - pastiche and doggerel
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
Leave it to Beaver
– The Shakespearean I.C.E. Episode
Dramatis Personae:
Ward, a husband and father
Wally, Ward’s teenaged son
June, Ward’s wife, accomplishing hussefery in a dress and
pearls
Beaver, Ward and June’s younger son
Ward:
Wally, I knowest thou hath merry plans for the morrow
But I must tell thee, to thy woe and sorrow
That thou’rt to stay home, and mow the lawn
Wally:
Oh, golly, gee, seest thou my face turn wan?
Beloved father, I cannot with thy orders comport
For I cannot find my comradely passport
Nor, in addition to that paperwork dearth,
Yea, verily, my certificate of birth!
Without which workers are subject to arrest
By I.C.E., as the news and warnings attest
June:
‘Tis true – I.C.E. feareth every gangbanger and yob
But they will imprison some kid at his job
And Superman might get thee; I.C.E. hired him today
That is his new truth, justice, and th’American way
Beaver:
Gee, Wally, if thou’rt carried to Alcatraz
Can I have thy room?
Voice Off:
We needeth no stinkin’ warrants!
Exeunt omnes, pursued by Dogberries with guns
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