my father was an angry man
who fumed with godlike fury when
someone like me had other plans
that constituted mortal sin
or less than steady revenue,
yet kneeled beside my bed when doubt
had displaced subtly all i knew,
trained substance of the altar vow--
as if this constant crossworld death
could be persuaded to relent,
could be defeated, sparing breath,
or carved out blue as light gets bent--
a son the perfect sacrifice,
as wine is poured and bread is sliced

I call on Blake for energy,
And Dickinson for everything.
And you my dark and distant muse
For new directions, founding stones,
The resurrection of a shrine,
Where I, an idler, hear your song--
Asleep and dreaming or awake,
Imagining your warm return.
White feathers of the world descend
On you, clear-hearted child of Jove
And memory.  I made you smile
Once through the night.  I'll try again,
If you're inclined, if you recall
Just how it worked as we reclined.

-


Momma died two decades ago,
she would have turned
seventy-eight to—day

i woke up and spoke with her
this morning, imagining her
with a long red Irish mane

about Daddy being laid up in a
nursing home, my brother and
i hoping to fix him before he
finally gives up

she said—  "nothing"

i think maybe this is because
she long ago saw the lights
up ahead, in a place where
human conversation would
be considered archaic

and birthdays rendered
as undefined

she is illuminated within it now,
there to later show the way for
the rest of us who continue
marking our calendars

as we persist here on Earth—
still enumerating yesterday,
to–day, and tomorrow...



s jones
30 Dec 2021


.

Most of the snow has melted now,
gray dough-banks ****** on curbs
under a wind-lacquered gloss.

The Thai salt sits in me, hours after,
stirs thru blue yarn veins,
sharp in the stomach's wax-pit.

Night declines when lamps snap on:
dead, reclusive salmon eyes that broadcast
onto the cold screens dotting the walk.

I haven't seen anyone for so many days -
my tongue is still as a lake skin.
Lost hearts voyage in whitened dunes

of all my yesterdays. The winter pattern
is so quiet. I am a crease in the fabric,
a black ache in the ruined prism.

Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                                The Tiger Cages of Ben Luc

In which there were no tigers, only boys
Locked in barbed-wire cages in the tropical sun
Teenagers in their country’s uniform
Unable even to stretch or stand or move

Punished for some minor infraction or other
Locked in barbed wire cages in the tropical sun
We were forbidden to talk to them, or even look
They waited in silence, they waited, and they thought

Locked in barbed-wire cages in the tropical sun -
And those poor lads are why the Communists won

Shall what cannot be finished
Be abandoned?
What should be done with love,
So strong and mortal--
The answer
To a question
Impossible to frame.
Hard work with poor material;
We should have made
A better god
I suppose,
Though what we have now
Must suffice,
Patched up and resurrected--
Blasphemous poets,
Lovers,
Something overwhelming,
Undefined,
A path not going
Anywhere we haven't been
And yet tonight--
Good earth our destination--
I see you and cannot
Reply,
Except to say,
As simply as a stubborn fool,
This is what we are.
And knowing that
Is far too much
To leave behind
Or otherwise believe.

Could be coffee or
The cat's indigestion again,
Looks like islands
On the vast yellow page,
The lawyer's pad,
Hispaniola with its stark
Divide,
Jamaica, Cuba,
A rhythm section of suppression,
Questioning the rights of man,
Woman, trans, some progress
At a price
Unknown.  Love,
The color of the sun,
Suggests itself in shadows
And reflections.

I chose a place you might find me,
Settled in and opened a road
Without making it too easy
Traveled,  waiting like some misplaced
Monk, who hasn't vowed to give up
Anything, knowing it would all be gone
In the devil's time and we'd sure
Have less to show for it all than
A preacher's feast on Sunday when
The prodigal daughter needed
A rededication and spoke
Her mind instead, saying this place
Could be Calvary, you know it
Maybe is.  I wouldn't be shocked.

Where this road leads, you might get lost.
When you've traveled it far enough
You recognize the signs, what's left
From target practice and the wind.
I'd give you more to go on if
I hadn't lost the thread and now
It's speculation mostly, though
A little moonlight still endures
And I'll be waiting if you need
A ride, or a place to walk by.

My losses don't add up to much,
The way that I remember them--
Money, a girlfriend who could ****
Like the devil, fight like a mink,
Still does with another old man.
The abyss lies most before me
And I'm eyeing it like a sailor
Who's seen storms before but not this.

Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                       “I Guess You Saw a Lot of Action, Huh?”

Don’t

You and I weren’t there; it’s none of our business
They will talk about it among themselves
Politely excluding us, as they should
Mostly each will grapple with it in the dark

Alone

You and I weren’t there; it’s none of our business
They might become more open when they are old
When God speaks to them from the desert and plain
But the decision is theirs; it is their pain

Theirs

You and I weren’t there; it’s none of our business
Don’t ask
Don’t even speak
Just leave it alone

I tell myself one life
must yield to another:
fly to spider,
spider to bird,
bird to birdshot.

I tell myself one life
must, in the full course
of a day relinquish itself
to another savage dawn,
fall as each unbidden

yesterday fell, bleak
and ungrieved, twisted
on a rack of tomorrows
no more certain than a silk
spooled about a winch.