When Fortune and Men's Eyes are in Disgrace - poem

 

 

Lawrence Hall, HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

When Fortune and Men’s Eyes are in Disgrace

 

Cf. Shakespeare, Sonnet 29

 

A good thing with being disgraced in men’s eyes

Is that that mostly they don’t notice you at all

As a nobody you are but a shadow at best

Or an accessory in their empty scenes

 

If they don’t notice you, then you are not disgraced

And you have better things to do anyway:

Children to raise, songs to sing, books to write

Each day’s honest labor at your honest craft

 

The resolution is

 

That some men might be disgraced in your eyes

That is, if you choose to notice them at all

And Why is There a Police Car in Your Driveway? - poem

 Lawrence Hall, HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

And Why is There a Police Car in Your Driveway?

 

Cf. Shakespeare, Sonnet 28

 

The days are a mess and so are the nights

Each day is burdened with labors unrelenting

Toils industrial and toils emotional

Everyone seems to want a bite of you

 

At night the stresses follow you to bed:

The boss’s write-ups seem to poison the pillows

The unpaid bills, the clapped-out car, the fears

The children’s report cards, the broken washer

 

You give life your all – you work, you struggle, you strive -

And why is there a cop car in your drive?

These Here So-Called Schools These Days - doggerel

 

Lawrence Hall, HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

These Here So-Called Schools These Days

  

“Lead, Follow, or Get the H*** Out of the Way” 

-a sign on the bulkhead in recruit training

  

Those coffee-shop cynics drowning in dejection:

Some of them wallow in existential abjection

And some meet every hope with an objection

Or with a sneering, irrelevant deflection

 

          But I did something other than b**** and moan

 

I voted in my local school board election

Weary with Dachshunds - poem

  

Lawrence Hall, HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

Weary with Dachshunds

 

Cf. Shakespeare, Sonnet 27

 

With an improving book I go to bed

                   (as P. G. Wodehouse said)

And two improving dachshunds on my pillow

                   (as Wodehouse almost said)

They then begin their journey at my head

Wriggling down to my feet and back again

 

They slurple messily from my bedside glass

And crumple up my copy of Hercule Poirot

Neither slows: they lick my nose, they tickle my toes

And will they finally doze? Nobody knows!

 

But

 

When comes the midnight moon, then all in a cuddly heap

Their little doggie noses snuffle at last in sleep

The President of Columbia University is Saddened - poem

 

Lawrence Hall, HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

The President of Columbia University is Saddened

 

“Why must we fight for the right to live, over and over, each time the sun rises?”

― Leon Uris, Exodus

 

Jews are not welcome in the cool universities

The laboratories are shut against them

Libraries, classrooms, meetings, coffee shops

Here, sir, the bullhorn rules (Hey! Hey! Ho! Ho!)

 

Administrators smile weakly and shrug:

We cannot guarantee your safety here

The Merovingian president says she is saddened

That Jewish students are harassed and beaten

 

The halls of academia are lined with swastikas

And 7 October is remembered with glee

The Golden Gate of Jerusalem - poem

  

Lawrence Hall, HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

The Golden Gate of Jerusalem

 

The Gate of Repentance

 

The Golden Gate captures the evening moon

Which shines upon the road a convict walked

At the rubbled base a snake pursues a rat

          a very troubled rat

While Roman squaddies stand the middle watch

 

The Gate of Mercy

 

The Golden Gate captures the morning sun

Whence the Messiah comes, or comes again

He is the Gate Himself, the Golden Gate

He comes from the Mount of Olives in golden light

 

The Golden Gate has been blocked for centuries -

This will not always be so

 

A Nation of Couch Schlubs Blames the Chinese Communists - doggerel

 

Lawrence Hall, HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

A Nation of Couch Schlubs Blames the Chinese Communists

 

A question may be brought about ownership

And the turgid content of the daily trawl

But even before the question of censorship

          One must ask:

Why is anyone on TikTok at all?