Saturday, September 28, 2024

His Check Engine Light is On - a weak excuse for a poem but there's a nice fresh metaphor

 


Lawrence Hall, HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

His Check Engine Light is On

 

He came by today, a friend from long ago

“I haven’t seen you in a hamster’s age.”

“Yep, too long.”

“How ya doin’?”

“Good enough for government service.”

“Wanna beer?

“Thought you’d never ask.”

“Kids all doin’ good?”

“Yeah; real proud of ‘em. All grown and gone. Yours?”

“Oh, yeah, doin’ doin’ just fine.”

“Heard you was in th’ hospital last year.”

“Yep, made almost about three months of of it.”

“Too much fun.”

“Yep.”

“At our age…”

“Yep.”

“Kids these days.”

“Yep.”

“You okay now?”

“Better’n I deserve. You?”

“Well, you know, my Check Engine light’s on.”

 

 

Fresh metaphors are scarcer than crocodile feathers. Thanks, Chris.

Meditation and Merriment in Early Autumn - poem

 

Lawrence Hall, HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

Meditation and Merriment in Early Autumn

 

     We cannot stay young and strong for long -

     Both of us have grey hair at the temples

 

-Du Fu, “To the Recluse Wei the Eighth”

 

After summer rains the earth is still green

In the cooling breeze oak leaves dance happily

Old lawn chairs are the humble chairs of poets

Old lawn chairs are the glorious thrones of kings

 

The seasons remind us of our mortality

We sit and ponder the mysteries of change

We will die, to be replaced by other poets

Who will sit and ponder the mysteries of change

 

And still, whatever these deep thoughts betoken -

I need to mow, but the lawn mower is broken

 

 

Three Hundred Tang Poems

Translated by Peter Harris

London: Everyman’s Library Pocket Poets, 2009

The Cosmic Inertia of a Six-Pound Dachshund - short poem

   

Lawrence Hall, HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

The Cosmic Inertia of a Six-Pound Dachshund

 

Why is the resistance factor

In shifting a six-pound dachshund

Who does not want to be shifted

Greater than that of tons of iron?

An All-You-Can-Eat Buffet of Summer Bugs poem

  

Lawrence Hall, HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

An All-You-Can-Eat Buffet of Summer Bugs

 

(He was small in the spring)

 

When a tree frog moves up in the world

He becomes a fashionable window frog

No longer the pain of a rough tree bark life

But rather the pane of easy living

 

(He grew larger during the summer)

 

My bedroom window is his buffet

An all-he-can-eat buffet of bugs

Delicious summer bugs shared around

With an uncommon house gecko of style

 

(He’s really big now)

 

I look out at a hungry tree frog, you see

But now – is he looking hungrily in at me?

Thursday, September 26, 2024

Boeing, Studebaker, John Deere, and my Tupperware Coffee Cup - an elegy

 

Lawrence Hall, HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

Boeing, Studebaker, John Deere, and my Tupperware™ Coffee Cup

 

 

“The days are gone…

When wonderful things were worked among them”

 

-The Seafarer, trans. Burton Raffel

 

 

My Tupperware coffee cup is as a chalice

With which I salute the beginning of each day

Cool, colorful, comforting craftsmanship

An honest, utilitarian work of art

 

We are told such things will be no more

“Made in USA” is “Factorum Romae

Younger nations will find us camping among the ruins

Of works and arts we no longer comprehend

 

A colonial soldier might note that once we were a great people

His colonel will reply, “Tosh! They’re simple savages.”

 

Smart*ss Watch - poem

  

Lawrence Hall, HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

Smart*ss Watch

 

It clings to my wrist like a faithless friend

Good fun to pal around when we met

But getting just a little tiresome with time

Unreliable in his many promises

 

He fails to make the appointments that we set

Or note the weather or mark activities

I dunno; maybe he’s making time with that Timex

My long-time steady who could sure tick my tock

 

Sweet face, delicate hands - she’d been around, but

Maybe I was wrong – I think I’ll dial her

Wednesday, September 25, 2024

On Reading a Poem by Du Mu - poem

 

Lawrence Hall, HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

On Reading a Poem by Du Mu

 

Everything is far away

China is ever so far away

The dynasties are far away

A golden dragon might fly us there

 

The moon is across the river

The blue-black river in the mist

A fishing boat is tied to the gate

The water-gate of our inn

 

What do they mean, the moon and boat?

Maybe the moon and the boat mean nothing

They simply are; they are themselves

Or perhaps we mean the moon and boat

 

Because of Du Mu and his words

The moon and the boat are forever

The blue-black river is forever

In reading of them so are we

 

 

“A Night at the Inn While Travelling”

Three Hundred Tang Poems

Translated by Peter Harris

London: Everyman’s Library Pocket Poets, 2009

Falling Into Truth - poem

   Lawrence Hall, HSG Mhall46184@aol.com                                                    Falling Into Truth   The fall of October’s leave...