Lawrence Hall
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.
Lawrence Hall
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?)
Lawrence Hall
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!
Lawrence Hall
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
Lawrence Hall
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
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
Some Adventure!
I saw the sunrise glory of Pike’s Peak
From the window of a car, for I was weak –
While morning freed the mountain from fog and gloom
I mostly saw the fluorescents in the emergency room!
(Many thanks to Dr. Lam and the other kind and considerate professionals, including the helpful security guard, at UC Memorial Hospital in Colorado Springs)
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
Your Heart as a
Tabernacle
From an idea by Blue Sapphire
The
heart is a tabernacle upon the Altar
Within
it reposes our hopes and dreams
We
open it as sacrament, as sacrifice
A
gift that in the end is given back to us
