Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
What Does an I.C.E. Agent
Do on His Day Off?
He might want to pause and meditate
Upon the 4th and 5th Amendments
(they’re in the file)
And the children he locked behind a barbed-wire gate
Or
He might prepare his defense for his Nuremburg trial
[The pronouns “he” and “his” are gender-neutral. This
certificate of pronoun compliance is provided for Dr. Karen, Ms. Grundy, and
the alligator-shoe boys at Target corporate.]
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
A Crude Review of my TV Service Provider
Unplug and re-set, wait
for the blue light
And wait and wait –
and now the controller’s not right
Our TV service is
known as Spectrum
Which, as you know,
rhymes with r****m
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
Ennui at the Gas Pumps
You Have Been Approved
Please Remove Card Now
Select Product
Remove Nozzle
Begin Fueling
Did you bring the fuel ticket?
This number is unclear; why is that?
The boss wants to see you.
Welcome to Another 16-Hour Day
Yep
Yep
Yep
(Sigh)
Give a Man a Fish or a Bucket Truck
Give a man a fish and he’ll eat for a day
Give a man a bucket truck and he’ll
Block
Every blind corner
Every rural road
Every lane
Every driveway
Every intersection
Every pasture access
Every field gate
In the county
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
The Manifest Destiny of
Cooking Shows
There are no national crises so desperate
Or times so burdened by uncertainty, despair, and fear
That the American people will not rouse themselves
To applaud some guy on TV cooking an omelet
And let the people cry, “WHOOO! WHOOO!”
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
Turning Over Parts of Poems with a Golden Shovel
A golden shovel poem well, okay, maybe
Or maybe it’s like digging up a friend
Rearranging his bits rearranging his bones
And exclaiming I have built a new body!
Maybe
A pile of bones there a pile of bones here
Another pile of bones a golden shovel
Ars per ars gizzards and gristle
The gravedigger wants his shovel back
Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
Her Delicate Wit and Charm
Her conversation and
her charming intellect
Delight not like champagne
in tingling sips
Bringing forth
knowledge, subtle and circumspect –
But rather like Lady Macbeth exercising her whips
