My 10th grade year,
Dad put my brother,
Tobin and I in a  
private school in  
Camarillo California.  
  
Mom sent us  
to live with him after  
we traded our  
education, back in  
Des Moines, for **** and  
sitting around  
listening to Led   
Zeppelin records in the  
basement.  
We had it all figured out.  
  
Before we started
a day of class, we  
went on a week-long   
skiing trip to  
Sequoia National Park.  
I loved that school.  
A passion grew in  
me for literature,   
Melville and Dickens,  
Dylan Thomas and the  
rest of the greats visited  
me in my dreams.  
They were good, gentle  
nights back then. 
 
I wrote a paper on  
Billy Budd, and received a C  
for my weak effort.  
Dad explained aspects of  
the story:  
plot  
theme  
antagonist  
protagonist  
and tragic character flaws.  
I didn’t get a C again on  
anything to do with  
literature.  
I was still inept  
with the numbers game.  
Math didn’t hold my  
Interest.  
It dog-paddled, then drowned in  
my budding poet brain.  
  
I had a gorgeous Dutch  
Girlfriend, Van Vleck or  
Van something or other.  
I acted in the play,  
and started at small   
forward on the   
basketball team.  
I even got into a  
fight with a kid for  
telling the principal that  
he sold me a little ****.  
I was suspended for a week,  
but Dad didn’t seem to  
mind that much.  

He gave me a copy of   
Don Quixote, and told   
me to write an essay a day.  
Back then, I was  
the prince of the private school.  
 I started to care about  
learning.   
The teachers taught with  
zeal and zest.  
The lust for literature was  
born in me  
beneath that smiling  
West Coast sunshine, and  
melancholy California fog.

There, in the
tide pool, dappled by
the sun is birth and death,
and the spark that continues.
It leaves mankind in the wake of regret.
What have I to do with the albatross
Or sea lion?
I can but write, while they fly and roar.
I gaze upon the Pacific from this rock,
all its mysteries and grandeur.
I am inferior, while it forever reigns with
every wave and break of light.

Chess in the
afternoon sun.
Jazz floats over
the silky couch.
Backs ache, while
hearts break.
Bishop takes knight,
and France falls again.

The masks are all
broken under the
cerulean blue skies,
while she eats berries,
and smiles in her
pink polka dot dress.
The pawns are all smug,
and Queenie's on the rag.
Italy surrenders, and from
the grave, Charlie Parker
still hammers home
those soft amber notes.
I can smell her heat, and
I think they play
jazz in hell.

I love the rain, but you dote on the sun
I sing for spring flowers and life-like trees
I gaze at the stars when the day is done
But you hide from the dusky canopy.
Your eyes are violet, but mine are not
Your hair is auburn, mine is like night
What I think each day are not your thoughts
Neither are we wrong, nor in the right.
Beneath the veneer, behind given names
I walk my walk and you do what you do
Despite the differences, we are the same
A heart beats in me as it does in you.
Together, let's revel in being alive -
Dance to the beats of the rhythm of life

I believe everything
Happens in a sequence
In an order

I don't need to be
Versed in religion

To understand that
Every test, every sickness

Is moulding me
Into a more concrete form

One with unshakeable foundation

Through every pain
Along my incision side

Made me softer
To other people's pain
And yet I'm grateful for it

The pain yesterday is worse
Than today's pain

And yet with that I still
Don't glorify pain

I just think it's the only way
That I truly learn

i thought i understood the water,
the silver whispers of stream,
dying the way sadness sighs  
like a star.

the water didn't bring me to
you or you to me.

you were not the shimmer of a
fish.

you were the light reflecting,
bold splashes of colour
on a bold canvas. you

were night when i could
hardly bear the night and you
fell through me

like twilight bringing black
marble moons and watery ghosts.

i thought i understood the water.
i thought the stars painted your
reflection on my lips,

but the silver whispers were not
sad they were happy and
i wondered how i ever
found them sad.

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

                                              The List is Death

There is said to be a list – but whose?
Who wrote it? Where is it? Where has it been?
On what teakwood desk does it now repose
Around which names and lives are negotiated

The matter is not that names are being removed
But that your name might be written in
Because your attitude has been noticed
The hand that once shook yours signs away your life

Someone pencils your name upon The List
That’s your loyalty reward (you won’t be missed)

Thoughts ‘n’ prayers as in Two Corinthians