It's All Anne Frank's Fault - poem

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love

Home - Hello Poetry

 

It’s All Anne Frank’s Fault

 

Imagine escaping the brick-pits of Goshen

Trekking the deserts with Joshua and Moses

Learning the Commandments, feeding on Mannah

Crossing the Jordan into the Promised Land

 

Imagine chanting the Psalms, learning from Isaiah

Teaching Proverbs and Wisdom to your children

Telling the ancient stories while working the fields

Braving the adventures God has given us

 

Imagine stepping outside after Mass

After sharing the body and blood of the Christ

 

And complaining that all the world’s problems

Are caused by “th’ Jews”

Thank You for Your Attention to This Matter - doggerel

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love

Home - Hello Poetry

 

Thank You for Your Attention to This Matter

 

Both sides waving American flags

Bodies in the streets like bundles of rags

Laundry on a Snowy Day - poem

 Lawrence Hall

mhall 46184@aol.com

                                       Laundry on a Snowy Day

 

Little fluffs of white floating through the air

Swirling and drifting and dancing merrily

Falling upon us as gently as a prayer

One landing on your nose momentarily

 

But this is not from the January snow

This puffy white stuff all over the floor

Because it has nowhere else to go

Except for Hoovering it up (a tiresome chore)

 

It flies from the dryer much like a rocket

Because

Someone always leaves Kleenex in her pocket!

The Coming Ice Storm - poem

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love

Home - Hello Poetry

 

The Coming Ice Storm

 

Wood for the fireplace stacked inside and out

Sterno for the camp stove, bottled water everywhere

Batteries, portable radios, toilet paper, lanterns

The outside faucets covered with plastic and old towels

 

Bedding for the pets in the laundry room

Mothball-scented blankets disposed here and there

The questions come as quickly as the wind:

What if…? What about…? What if…? What about…?

 

The day is grey and darkens even more

As strange blue light falls upon us from the north

Can You Describe This? - poem

  

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love

Home - Hello Poetry

 

Can You Describe This?

 

-Anna Ahkmatova, Requiem

 

Supplicants waiting in long lines in the snow

Hoping to give their children some sense of truth

Among the gassings of electronic screens

Protestors and federals bellowing in turn

 

The news blows in as Siberian flurries

Some flailing this way, and some trailing that

Footprints disappear among the drifts

Rasputin’s body might float up in the spring

 

Describe each human as a number, as a stat

“Truth?” sneered Pontius Pilate, “now what is that?”

 

“Can you describe this?” a woman asked Ahkmatova

 

“Yes, I can,” she spoke, she wrote, she lived

A Children's Bedtime Litany for 2026 - poem

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love

Home - Hello Poetry

 

A Children’s Bedtime Litany for 2026

 

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit

 

From the ICE-men who break into our homes and beat up our families

                                      Deliver us, O Lord

 

From the anti-ICE who invade our churches on Sunday mornings

                                      Deliver us, O Lord

 

From the ICE gunfire in our streets

                                      Deliver us, O Lord

 

From the anti-ICE gunfire in our streets

                                      Deliver us, O Lord

 

From the tear gas on our playgrounds

                                      Deliver us, O Lord

 

From government-sponsored kidnappings

                                      Deliver us, O Lord

 

From fires and looting

                                      Deliver us, O Lord

 

From explosions in the night

                                      Deliver us, O Lord

 

From strangers roaming around with guns

                                      Deliver us, O Lord

 

From the unmarked SUVs that circle our block

                                      Deliver us, O Lord

 

From the violence-pornographers who take our pictures

                                      Deliver us, O Lord

 

Grant your children rest this night, O Lord

Or if we must be wakeful

Make the shooting stop

 

Amen

 

In the Name of…shhhhh!...they’re beating on the door…don’t let them hear you…

A Complimentary Tote - poem

  

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

Dispatches for the Colonial Office

LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love

Home - Hello Poetry

 

A Complimentary Tote

 

How very nice of you to check me out

Of all the things you could have bought today

You purchased a tote, which shows your good sense

And you picked me, which shows your good taste

 

Those are some great shoes you’re wearing

And your watch is a study in elegance

Proper dress is all about the accessories

I’m proud to be seen with such a classy lady

 

Wait – diapers? I gotta carry dirty diapers!?

And those dirty baby-bottom wipers!?

 

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!