Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

         By Reading This Content You Agree to Our Privacy Policy


          It was terribly dangerous to let your thoughts wander
          when you were…within range of a telescreen.

                                             -Orwell, 1984


But your privacy? Nah; deal with it, you see
Baked beans, magazines and mountain scenes
Vacation trips and handy houseware tips -
They see you, they know you, they hunt you

Podcasts, partisan views, gossipy news
Engine parts, how-to vids, and funny kids
Treating head lice, tax advice, dancing mice
They see you, they know you, they hunt you

Through your made-in-Shanghai Palantir
Adverts will forever make you fear,
                         My Precious



(“Palantir” is here an allusion to Tolkien’s genius, not to the software people.)

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                      Nora, Theo, and Pushkin-the-Rescue-Cat

After rough adventures Pushkin has found his way home
The children celebrate with him his happy new life
By crowning their purring prince with vines and flowers
And he is pleased to accept their adoration and love

Too soon children must leave their merriments
And rebuild civilization among the wreckages
In a time of hatreds and ideologies
When all seem to have forgotten the way to Jerusalem

And so for now

May children enjoy the springtime of their lives
For they (and the cat) remind us of our appointed path

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                                            ­     Porta Coeli

                        “I pray you, sir, remember the porter”

                                          -Macbeth II.iii.20ff

We are all porters; we open doors for others
Sometimes we open them for ourselves
If we close a door, it is against the rain and cold
And not against each other


(Yes, in Macbeth the Porter is drunk and inept, and when he says “remember the porter” he is asking for a tip in spite of his incompetence. I put the line in anyway because porters, actual or metaphorical, are servants, as are we all.)

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

      People Who Give Children Jack Chick Tracts for Halloween


    Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone?

                                          -Saint Matthew 7: 9


If someone gives your child a Jack Chick
That is not a well-intentioned mistake
He is giving your child bigotry and fear
Hellish hatred, existential despair

If someone gives your child a Jack Chick
He is giving your child demons to haunt her dreams
Crude visions of sin to blight her happiness
His own satanic fears to destroy her hopes

If someone gives your child a Jack Chick
He is telling her that Jesus judges her ******

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                                      The Man Who Never

A bottle in the weeds along the road
A plastic remnant of the American game:
If you drink this fizzy and smoke a toad
You’ll get the car, the house, the girl, the fame

Nahhh

Another forty-something without a job
Just self-pitying songs on the radio
Stealing someone’s gas, another sucker to rob
Bumming money from Mom for no place to go                  

They didn’t believe in you, but you got ‘em showed -
Yeah, dude, you built a career along this road

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                                            She Made Life Fun

She made life fun. And then she died. She died
This is her coffee cup. She drank from it
She drank from it sitting in the break room
Making jokes and reading ****** novels

She made life fun. I’ll drink from her old cup
Maybe I’ll make life fun for others as she did
If there is magic in this cracked ceramic
A cup of blessings to be shared all around

She made life fun
And then she died

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

         The Most Embarrassed Young Father in All of Christendom

                                   I will go in to the Altar of God.
                                   To God who giveth joy to my youth.

                                      -The Roman Missal, 1962

The processional had hardly ended
With each minister and server in place
Each knee for a moment respectfully bended
In acknowledgement of God’s gentle Grace

When came to our ears a frightening assault
Of sirens and horns, and then flashing lights
Beneath the sanctuary’s sacred vault
A catalogue of wild electronic frights

To the narthex door a father rushed
Awkwardly in the sight of God and man
His handsome manly face was deeply flushed
His son’s toy helicopter was clutched in his hands

He carried the noisy gadget far away -
(A true helicopter parent we may say!)
We delight in our children; for them we pray
And thank God for all families this Sabbath day

                                 I will go in to the Altar of God.
                                 To God who giveth youthful joy to old age.

                                                   -Parenting 1301