Saint Matthew chapter 6, verses 1 through 4
That’s in the Bible too – don’t be a bore

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                                             You are not a Banana

                                  Sticker Not, Lest Ye be Stickered

A banana bears a sticker to say it is a banana
(The banana, that is, not the paper sticker)
Even though a banana is obviously a banana
(It has a yellow skin and some squashy stuff inside)

If we take the banana sticker from the banana
And stick the ticker to a tomato
The tomato is not then a banana
However much someone claims it so

Sticking sticky stickers to humans is also wrong
A man is himself; a woman is herself
If we stick a sticky sticker to a human
As a joke, well, that’s just a bit of fun

But if as a judgement then we are false witnesses

Stickers, nothing but stickers, excuses
Failures of intellect, truth, and caritas
Stickers are two-dimensional; they have no depth
Stickers are useless even on bananas

We are brothers and sisters, not bananas

Old and Unselected Poems

Pale, penciled scribblings, old bits, old notes
Forgotten drafts in old books shelved away
And lines painfully worked out during lectures
About Napoleon’s painful hemorrhoids

And the declensions of those Latin nouns
Which with their verbs Omnis Gallia divisit
Or something like that, forgotten long ago -
But not
              her hair
                             her voice
                                              her smile
                                                           ­    her eyes

Others cannot write to her happy theme -
She writes herself as iambs in a dream

Our fathers told of hard times on the farm
Of walking barefoot down the road to school
And walking home again to get the cows back up
From woods and fields to the old dairy barn

And joining the Army at seventeen
Sleeping later in boot camp than on the farm
Coming home from the war to look for a job
Thirty years at the sawmill – then laid off

And in his turn a New Man proudly says:

I scored real high on Minecraft on my ‘phone
While standing in line for my free school supplies

What Went ye into the Desert to See?

What went ye into the desert to see?
A pale liturgist swaying in the wind?
A theologian dressed in soft clichés?
But what went ye to the desert to see?
Thyself, holier than anyone else?
A profit on your Catholic Me-‘blog?
But what ye went out there to see?

Go back.  Go back to the desert, and there
See the least grain of sand, larger than thee.

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

                        Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Delta, Echo…

They say (because there’s always a “they” to say)
That a new variant has come to harry us
With death, the fear of death, the denial of death
Even along crowded corridors of death

Where masses stumble over war metaphors
In the torchlight of perpetual outrage
While clenching fists and chanting molossus shrieks
In their world lit only by glowing screens

But you and I – we have our garden to work
Children to raise, and poetry to write

And God in Whom to trust

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                                   Did You Enjoy Your Christmas?


                                               Christmas Night


That merry little Christmas that they sing about –
Did you open your gifts around a tree
Tinsel and ornaments and a brilliant star
Pajamas and cocoa and merriment

Did you enjoy a dinner with someone special
Or with happy children and a few friends
Then coffee and cake and quiet memories
Everyone free from telescreens and devices

And now with a fire and soft candlelight
Is this another gentle silent night?

I hope it is so, dear friend

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

                                     ­    Undocumented Gardening

Last week I planted my autumn garden
No permits were required
This evening I dragged hoses in the drought
No reports were assigned

This morning I freshened the water for the bees
There was no sign-in sheet
And then I used a machine for cutting weeds
No evaluations

And then while resting in the leafy shade
I inventoried the grasses, blade by blade

Thousands of meters high, and hardly a breath
A sales call there among the frozen scree
And if you fall there, screaming to your death
Are you charged an early termination fee?

Pontius Pilate was probably being flippant
When he asked of a prisoner, “What is truth?”

But he was an administrator, and so
He possibly did not know

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

                          Late at Night on Christmas Eve

After breakfast with a friend
After setting up for a family luncheon
After a family luncheon that never seemed to end
After cleaning up after a family luncheon
(and that, too, never seemed to end)
After a moment of sitting and thinking with wife and child
After opening gifts (with dachshunds and cats)
After sharing gifts (with dachshunds and cats)
After keeping dachshunds and cats from eating the tree ornaments
After watching Judy Garland sing “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”
After sitting exhausted with a therapeutic episode of The Office
You realize
The day wasn’t so bad

“Monarchy can easily be ‘debunked’, but watch the faces, mark well the accents of the debunkers. These are the men whose taproot in Eden has been cut -- whom no rumor of the polyphony, the dance, can reach – men to whom pebbles laid in a row are more beautiful than an arch. Yet even if they desire mere equality they cannot reach it. Where men are forbidden to honor a king they honor millionaires, athletes, or film-stars instead -- even famous prostitutes or gangsters. For spiritual nature, like ****** nature, will be served -- deny it food and it will gobble poison.”


Quote by C.S. Lewis: “Monarchy can easily be "debunked", but watch th...” (goodreads.com)

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

                                            You are a Solitaire

A generation cannot choose to be lost
Even though many might give up on life
Sulk in self-pity in a crowded space
As if no one ever suffered before

But trust yourself to make a stronger choice
Refuse to be defined except by you
Consider the teachings of the wise, not the loud
And build your life by the standards you set

For after all, you are not a generation -
You are your own creative, industrious self

The dribbling Head in That Hideous Strength
A man behind a curtain, pulling cords
How many fingers, Winston, six or five?
Mrs. Wilson holding the president’s pen

Doctor Wakefield will see your children now
Sender Gleiwitz is very clear tonight
Reporting North Vietnamese attack boats
Sailing in crop circles to Area 51

A child abused upon The People’s throne

Go to the rostrum

We will tell you what to say

Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com
Dispatches for the Colonial Office

                            Your Poems as Love-Letters to God


          Gregariousness is always the refuge of mediocrities, whether
          they swear by Soloviev or Kant or Marx. Only individuals
          seek the truth, and they break with those who don’t love it
          sufficiently.

                 -Doctor Zhivago, p. 9 in the Pantheon edition


You live, you have lived, and you will live
And because you live you will engrave your life
In elegant scansion, in noble lines
That shape chaos into beauty and truth

Not into metal or rocks or wood
But flung into Creation in gratitude
For the sacred life you have been given
For the strength of your love and thoughts

Each little line is a gathering-gift to God
Baptized in the Jordan and in the Hippocrene
To God, and to the Muses who smile on you
And to great Mysteries beyond the stars

Each little line is a gathering-gift to all
To read in the light of seven sacred lamps
The wisdom of patience and pilgrimage
Beside the banks of the river you know

You live, and so you write, you must, you must:
For there is meaning in tumbling in the grass
On a summer day that will live forever
Helped along in your written remembrancing

You live an eternal meaning in the why
Of laughter and puppy-kissings and grass-stained jeans
And that is why you must write it all down
For others in intellectually-sharpened rhythms

You live an eternal meaning in the why
Of love, of deeper kissings in the dark
Emotional confusions gone crazy-wild
Until they are sensed through crafted verse

You live an eternal meaning in the why
Of recruit training and sometimes war
The joys of learning wisdom from great books
Tentatively shaping your own new knowledge worthily

You live an eternal meaning in the why
Of leafy springs and apple-green summers
Golden autumns and winters of blue
Writing them as hymns of gratitude

You live an eternal meaning in the why
Of children in a home modest in wealth
But rich and layered in love, work, and prayer
“Is this poem about me?!” Oh, yes, child

You live an eternal meaning in the why
Of lonely nights, hospital stays, mistakes
Disappearing dreams, disappointed hopes
Memories of friends buried in the dust

You live, you have lived, and you will live
And because you live you will engrave your life
Love-letters as your gift to Creation
In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti

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

                         “Parole,” He Replied, “I’m Afraid of Parole.”

                                    What are you most afraid of?

“Parole,” he said, and the others agreed
“I don’t like it in here; I don’t have any choices
But no one expects anything much of me
I can’t make any choices, so I can’t fail

“But out there – there – I have to make choices
I have to live up to my kid’s expectations
I have to live like a man, show some initiative
Get up and go to work without being told

“Most of all, I’m afraid of letting my kid down
I might fail him, like I did before

And that’s the scariest thing of all”

Poldark

What it is about
A three-cornered hat all grim
That makes women swoon?


*(I don’t think it’s the hat, man)

Fragments in a Fragmented Season

Neither a cyber-warrior nor a cyber-worrier be

But is this flower a patriotic flower?

The nation that never had much use for me
Except to send me to an undeclared war
Is suddenly broken

Was I playing with the puppies when the revolution began
And so didn’t notice?

“Take It Down!” someone scrawled on a statue in New Orleans
Dear New Orleans: Saint Joan of Arc was never a Confederate

Dear Canada: Do you really want to be a republic?

The vice-president takes shelter within his armored hair, and is silent

The Real Knees of Irving, Texas

Think about a Wal-Mart employee taking a knee during the morning Wal-Mart chant

It’s the Russians, no doubt

Chess ratings are up

Everything’s an Orwellian Two-Minutes’ Hate now.  Even the hours and seconds are outraged

“Your attitude’s been noticed, comrade.”  - House Warden to Yuri in Doctor Zhivago

Maybe the Republic will be in better shape next season.

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                            Hurricane Track Attack Forth and Back

Spaghetti models are not really spaghetti
But only colored lines across electric maps
Squiggling in iridescence around the Gulf
Slithering atop the waves, then to your house

The weather reporters’ cliches fall from the skies
As microbursts of bottled-water-babbles
Canned goods and fresh radio batteries
Tune to this station as your roof blows away

Spaghetti models are not really spaghetti
But watch the newsie in the street – he’s getting all wet-ty!

POLICE LINE DO NOT CROSS POLICE LINE DO NOT CROSS

Another world beyond the yellow tape:
Chaos and smoke, confusion, blood, and pain
A wreckage of souls, cigarettes, and beer
Grim death encompassed within appointed bounds.

Some order on this side the yellow tape:
Cheeseburgers and fries, sodas in paper cups
MePhones uplifted in Hitlerian salute
Recording the pagan chant: “***!”

Sung by life’s postulants surprised to see
Another world beyond the yellow tape

“I sure like your blowed-up hair!
A lovely day!
A lovely day!
Let’s light a candle for your blowed-up hair!

No ideas for being locked in for a week!
It’s later!
Play with the peacocks and the monkeys yesterday!
Play with the peacocks and the monkeys yesterday!

Well y’all have a blessed day! A blessed day!”

A kind voice from the next booth: “Bless her heart.”

                                 Amen

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

                                     Remembering Rod McKuen

But of course some are vituperative – they aren’t him
The young still read his books, discreetly now
Because he isn’t cool in this unhappy time
The old still read his books – he saved their youth

But of course some are vituperative – they aren’t you
The young will read your books someday and know
That you have captured on paper their lives
And they will give their hearts freely to you

I hear that you are thinking of giving up poetry
You shouldn’t, you know – because while it is true
That you have a gift, you should always remember
That you are a gift, and the young need you

During a thunderstorm a little frog
For reasons best known to its grey-green self
Climbed stickey-toed into the chambers of
The gauge, then begged for life as the water rose

Made in China of toxic plastic for
The Weather Consortium Collective ®™
All-natural collection of earth-safe
Weather instruments to save the animals

I took it to the lawn, and gentled it out
During a thunderstorm, a little frog

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

         An Old Man in the Hardware Store Considers Autumn

                   “And He has poured down for you the rain”

                                                       -Joel 2:23

“When I’m through here,” he laughed, “I’m going home
I’m going to sit and listen to the rain
My hayfield’s all burnt up, my yard is dead
So I’m gonna to let the rain sing me to sleep”

We said our good-byes to the driest summer ever
And a thank you, Jesus for sweet rain at last
Next to the paper sacks of deer-bait corn
And a display of made-in-China tools

The wind blew open the heavy double doors
And the rain blew with it, and we were glad

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

For a Methodist Minister Newly Posted

We feel sometimes, we know sometimes, that we
Are aliens here, exiles and witnesses
As Abraham was sent from his father’s house
And Moses as a child was set adrift

The Apostles upon their voyages
By blood declare there is no lasting home,
Not here, so trusting in God to guide His ark
We thus are cast upon the waters of baptism

For on this planet each of us arrives
Afloat and in a Hebrew blanket wrapped

Viet-Nam Service Medal

A dragon lurks among the bamboo trees
And if sometimes half-hidden, still, always there
Sometimes half-forgotten, but always there
Is he a glorious dragon? Sometimes, yes

But then some nights he stirs the leaves awake
His eyes – they seem to flicker through the dark
His claws – they tear into the freighted soul
His blood – like Duncan’s, will not wash away

But dragons are good – what is it that one sees
If not a dragon lurking among the trees?

January with Blanket and Book

Dark weeks of wind and clouds and rain have passed
Into the east where wild storms go to die
While in the west above the woods the moon
A glowing curve of cold reigns over the sky

Now close the door after a lingering look
Upon silence and frost this January night
And dream by the fire, with blanket and book,
Sweet images of spring in the flickering light

And sunlight tomorrow - the frost won’t last
Long weeks of wind and clouds and rain have passed

Emmaus isn’t on the Map

The road from Emmaus is not in the book
Emmaus isn’t even on the map
Still, people walk to Emmaus every day
And then they go away to somewhere else

Because while everyone visits Emmaus
It’s only for supper and a new assignment
Although the directions seem somewhat vague
Those who have been there seem to know the way

The road to Emmaus is in the book
The road out of town is mapped in the heart

Some prophets spoke before the thrones of kings
And others at the gates of Jerusalem
One stood upon a rock and split the sea
And others heard God in the soft, soft wind

A prophet of our time at a table stood
Before a cafeteria table draped in cloth
Fronted a trinity of microphones
And split complacency that rainy day

Umbrellas were dripping, the sky was low
A prophet spoke to us, and we did not know

The rain makes even concrete beautiful:
A drop, then two, and then a singing shower
Baptizing the pavement with little pools
That catch the lights and bounce them all about:

Street lights all golden, rippling up and down
And automobile lights slipping across
The other lights, interrupted by feet
Splashing and slipping all the wet way home

And you, dancing about in the puddles -
The rain makes even love more beautiful



(A brief look through the InterGossip does not show that “Rain Makes Even Concrete Beautiful” has been used as the title for a song or poem or other “spot of art” (as Bertie Wooster would say). If it has, please advise me so I can change it.)

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

            Somewhere in New Mexico I tipped a Waitress 25%

        NOT I - NOT ANYONE else, can travel that road for
        you.   You must travel it for yourself.

                                         -Walt Whitman

On a cool autumn morning in New Mexico
A greasy spoon along the interstate
Walt Whitman and I enjoyed breakfast together
Bacon and eggs, hash browns, coffee and toast

And it was very good – no heaves of gas
But Whitman found an errand in some other soul
And sang a different self to California
McKuen rode with me the rest of the way

Breakfast was ninety-five cents; I added a quarter
The waitress was happy, and so were we all

Clinic Waiting Room with French Impressionists

The ball-capped men, old men, sit motionless
Arms folded in existential disapproval
They read not, no, and neither do they toil1
Over boxes that light up and make noise

French impressionist lilies soften the walls
Echoing with educational racket
A cartoon shark counting the numbers off
To a child embalmed in a plastic box

While his mee-maw looks to eternity
Through a door that opens from the other side

1Saint Matthew 6:28-29

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                             Thanksgiving as a Singleton

Memories of a drive-through just won’t do
Set something on your table, if only for you
A turkey plate from the grocery store
Two side dishes from cans, or maybe more
And gravy even if it’s a store-bought broth
Silverware, real plates, and a tablecloth
Wash your hands, light a candle, say a prayer
And open your napkin with your special flair!

You are where you are meant to be, it’s true
And know that God is with you to see you through

Cruisin’ best speed, foot lightly on the gas
But suddenly, alarm, alack, alas!
Around a curve, vultures lunching en masse
(On ‘possum de jour, a rotting, sodden mass)
One panicked bird leaped up to fly and pass
But wobble-crashed into the windshield glass
He bumped, he bounced, he bonked upon his (brass)
His life flailed out among the roadside grass

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com
Dispatches for the Colonial Office

                                    The October Squirrel Festival

                              For Jerry Nobles, of Happy Memory
                              Our Town Pharmacist and a Joyful Friend

Squirrels!

They’re up the trees; they’re down the trees
They swarm each other just like bees
They’re up the oak; they’re down the pine
They really need a traffic fine

Dachshunds!

Our outraged pups – they yap and bark
While chasing squirrels all over the park
Dachshunds are usual merry and curious
But with squirrels they are fast and furious

But not fast enough

Cats!

Tuxedo-Cat, all proper and prim
Disapproves of the others with a face all grim

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

                                     No Howling, Please

                                   A rebuke to Ginsberg
           While acknowledging that the typewriter is indeed holy

I saw the best of my generation
Refuse to howl, not in the situational poverty
Of their birth, not in others’ noise and drugs
Not in their elders’ go-fight-our-wars-for-us

I saw the best of my generation
Doubling up in unfurnished rooms
Doubling up on the day and night shifts
Making each sweated-out life into a poem

I saw the best of my generation
Work
                     and thus rebuked for their privilege

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

                      Waiting for the Messiah Someplace Else

     Motel: Rabbi, we've been waiting for the Messiah all our lives.
     Wouldn't now be a good time for him to come?

      Rabbi: I guess we'll have to wait someplace else.

                                   -Fiddler on the Roof

And so we wait, here where we are, the time
Marked off by calends and by candlelight
Four Gospels in a ring of holy fire
Before the Altar, and before the Throne

The Magi journey through space and time
Our journey is in waiting for a star
To shine upon us all, and lead us to
The Temple where all waiting finally ends

Beside an Altar of repose in a Stable
A cradle of wood from Eden and the Ark

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

                     Art 101 and 102 for Dudes in Costume Hats

For 1971’s Beret Art Dude

When paint can mean anything you want it to mean
Then it has no meaning
                                      and neither do you


For 2021’s Baseball Cap Art Dude

When you paint ideological commands
You’re just obeying
                               your master’s orders

Forestry for Romantics

Silence obtains in the forest clearing
The leaves all seem to be holding their breath
Little rabbit pellets on a pine tree stump
Cut only yesterday, still oozing sap

Fresh raccoon paw-prints in the muddy spots
But nothing moves – we are intruders here
Suddenly a silent shadow – a hooded hawk
Over there – a woodpecker drilling for bugs

If we hold still, stand still, not whisper a word
The forest will return to her appointed works

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                                    Standing the Test of Time

So tell me about life’s test – is it multiple-guess?
Or fill-in-the-blanks for my empty mind
If the most common answer is C…oh, what a mess!
Gimme a hint, Teach; I’m falling behind!

Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com
Dispatches for the Colonial Office

                    President Musk and His Five Bullet Points

I was a federal employee in Viet-Nam
(More than five bullets and mortar bombs)
No one in Washington demanded I document my day
Or offered to send me home early with eight months’ pay

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

                          The Unfashion of the Romantics

                    …the romance of intellectual adventure.

                      -Daisy Hay, preface to Young Romantics

Thesis:

The Romantics are simply demode, my dear
Those structured paleo-colonialists
Who rattle on about flowers and love
And craft blank verse about walks in the wood

Antithesis:

Oh, but note, if you will, young lovers who
Thoughtlessly put their sunlit heads together
Over an open Keats, reading to each other
Among the unwritten leaves of their youth

And now note, if you will, young thinkers who
Thoughtfully put their sunlit words together
Over an open Byron, arguing for freedom
Among and for the peoples of the earth

Synthesis:

The young are lines of iambic pentameter
New lines, new lives, discovered in each other

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

                               Seven Haiku for the Pleiades

The seventh poem – think of the Subaru badge – is not seen. That thoughtful poem is the one you will write.


1.  Two Goddesses and a God Come to Visit

All in the same sky:
Luna, Venus, Jupiter
While the soft winds sigh


2.  Barefoot in the Stilly Dawn

Barefoot in the grass
Eyes to the east, the stilly dawn
The stars have withdrawn

.
3.  Dachshunds on Their Dawn Patrol

Every dachshund thinks
That she is a timber wolf -
Perhaps it is so


4.  Summer Lingers

Yes, summer lingers
Crickets sing throughout the night
Their October hymns


5.  A Prison Visit

The horizon has no meaning
If the prisoners look up -
Concertina wire


6.  The Prayers of Planets and Stars

The planets and stars
Need not our prayers; they never sinned -
Do they pray for us?

A table of Jesus-stuff at the door
A beefish man in gas-station shades
Channeling Chaucer’s Pardoner – he ain't
Never heard of him – in peddling salvation

“It’s for the church. It’s for the missions,” he says
Ignored by most.  Then in a mutton moment
He spreads his legs and clutches at his (faith)
Laughing a pelvic ****** at his fellow apostle

A gormless guide to The Golden Shore
Touting tawdries and tidings at the truck stop door

The Russian soldier, Moskina1 in hand,
Though filthy, tired, unknown, unpaid, unfed,
Fights for his God, his Czar, and his Fatherland:
No medals, no *****, no sleep, no bread

His clumsy lowest-bidder boots,2 they rot
Into the foulness where the world’s sins pitch
Into the slime of old Iscariot3
Good men to die in some Gehenna-ditch

Saint George, Saint Michael, and Saint Seraphim
Preserve him in the end from Judas’ crime4
Life’s-end tears, life’s-end prayers, a blood-choked scream
And so he climbs the trench wall one last time,

Three cartridges5 clenched in his frozen fist,
He disappears at last into the mist6


1. Mosin-Nagant rifle
2. Betrayal by contractors
3. Betrayal by politicians and Bolsheviks
4. The Russian soldier does not fail in his his duty
5. Ammunition shortage  / God, Czar, and Fatherland
6. The Russian soldier is known to God

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com


                         If You Love Someone Deeply Enough…

                                           -Brigadoon, 1954

Mr. Lundie says that if you love someone deeply enough anything is possible

Probably not

But for an hour - or a century - we can dream

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

                          We Have No Enemies Among the Dead

                              For the Young Crew of the Moskva
                                                  14 April 2022

                                Eternal Father, strong to save,
                                Whose arm hath bound the restless wave...
                                O hear us when we cry to thee
                                For those in peril on the sea

                                             -The Navy Hymn

Proud admirals and presidents rattle their medals

The young - in screams among burst steam lines die
Explosions and darkness and seawater and hatches sealed
The bulkheads blown, there is no up, no down
Only pain and horror and throat-torn shrieks

Proud admirals and presidents jing-aling their medals

Training manuals, pocketknives, and comic books
Naughty pinups, letters from Mom, wrenches, and boots
Toolboxes, ball-point pens, and coffee cups
Fall with the young deep down into the sea

Proud admirals and presidents dazzle the room with their medals

Mothers and fathers grieve in emptiness
Our Leaders caution them to mind their attitude

Proud admirals and presidents – to Hell with their medals

1st Waitress

                    “Like, the flag’s waving in the wind, okay?
                    But there ain’t no wind on the moon.  I’ve been
                    Graduated two years, and they can’t fool me.”

2nd Waitress

                    “It was, like, on a pole and stuff, you know?”

1st Waitress

                    “They would say that, wouldn’t they, right? Okay?”

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

                                                       Offenders

                                   to St. Jude – a petition for prisoners

In the system they’re called offenders
No one knows why; the offenses are over
Concrete dorms, three-high bunks, white uniforms
And overhead the sting of fluorescents

I’m not going all Pollyanna here
All of them know the poisonous passions of ****
The stench of blood, the sting of fluorescents
In fearing eyes in a gas station at night

The stench of cells, the sting of fluorescents
In glaring eyes in the booking area at night
Humiliations, transports, stripped and searched
Form a straight line with hands behind your backs

But still, a man’s a man

The difference between a man inside the wire
And a man outside the wire
Is often only that one man is inside the wire
And the other man is outside the wire

“For all have sinned…”

Christmas is coming

Will there be a letter from home?

St. Jude, help all of us to be better men

In spite of ourselves