I watch the prom Dance,
In an awkward stance,
my friends walk in with dates,
and the excitement Abates.
Alone in a corner,
I mope like a mourner,
With no partner to dance with,
No gentleman to prance with.
Amidst the mirth and cheers,
My eyes fill up with tears.

I rush out into the open air,
And by Jove! I see Voltaire!
With his satirical charms,
He draws me in his arms.
As I sway to the beats,
I'm waltzing with Keats.
Causing my funny bone to arouse,
Enters P.G.  Wodehouse!
Using nonchalant wittiness,
He acknowledges my prettiness.
And then walks in Shakespeare,
Who  wipes away my tear,
And my senses curdle like curds,
As he showers me with words.
While I repress the excited child,
I'm swaying with Oscar Wilde.
I'm rendered helplessly mute,
With his phrases so astute.
With a proposal so verse-y,
I'm serenaded by Shelly  B. Percy.
And before this fantasy can spoil,
I fox trot with  Conan Doyle.

And thus literally seduced,
into putty I'm reduced.
I am platonic-ally smitten,
By the genius of what they've written.
The dating circus can’t make me cry,
because a host of paramours have I.

…These men are worth your tears:
You are not worth their merriment.

-Wilfred Owen, “Apologia Pro Poemate Meo”

When that loudmouth on the wireless machine
Alludes to Western Civilization
What does he mean? Paradise Lost? Probably not
Nor Saint Paul speaking on the Field of Mars

The Kalevala, Hagia Sophia
With its pendentives lifting up our prayers
Horatius fighting to defend his bridge
And Wilfred Owen dying bravely on his

Lord Tennyson and Idylls of the King
Chapultepec, Henry V, Becket
The paratroops at Arnhem, Saint Thomas More,
His King’s loyal servant, but God’s first

The Stray Dog poets of Saint Petersburg
The brave last stand of Roland at Roncesvalles
Lewis and Tolkien and glasses of beer
Montcalm and Wolfe on the Plains of Abraham

Hildegard von Bingen, Siegfried and the Rhine
Magna Carta, HMS Hood, the Thames
The Grove of Daphne, “The Old Rugged Cross”
Beatrix Potter and her little pet rabbit

El Cid, Anne Frank, John Keats, Saint Benedict
“I Have a Dream,” Dostoyevsky, and Greene
Viktor Frankl, Dag Hammarkskjold, and Proust
Good Chaucer’s naughty pilgrims telling tales

The Gettysburg Address, Willie and Joe
Stern Saint Augustine of North Africa
Wodehouse writing a jolly bit of fun
Saint Corbinian and Bavaria

The ancient glories of Byzantium
Pius XII contra the bombs and lies
The 602nd TD Battalion
Saint Joan, the Prado, and Robert Frost

And far, far more.

When that loudmouth on the wireless machine
Alludes to Western Civilization
What does he mean?

Disaster Preparedness Checklist**

Double-A batteries, a map out of town
A tank full of gas, a mind full of plans
A flashlight, toilet paper, a radio
A can opener and cans to go, go, go

Leather gloves and duct tape, whistles
Waterproof matches, and match-proof water
Blankies and ponchos and a change of clothes
A medical kit and a pocket knife

But

No one ever lists a box of cigars,
And a Wodehouse for reading by lamplight

Not much longer now before we and Keats
Must pack up all our impedimenta
Into a photocopier paper box
And after a Wal-Mart-cake reception – leave

No one will notice us, and that’s okay
Thomas and Frost will meet us with the car
Greene will suggest that we go for a drink
The designated driver might be Shakespeare

With Fermor beside him reading the map
Guareschi and Wodehouse laughing in the back
Lewis and Chesterton will bring the beer
And Leonard Cohen will adjust his hat

In God’s name we will sit under the apple trees
And tell merry tales of the lives of kings


          And whether we shall meet again I know not.
          Therefore our everlasting farewell take:
          For ever, and for ever, farewell…
          If we do meet again, why, we shall smile;
          If not, why, then, this parting was well made.

                             -Julius Caesar V.1.115-119

Hurricane Preparedness Checklist

Double-A batteries, a map out of town
A tank full of gas, a mind full of plans
A flashlight, toilet paper, a radio
A can opener and cans to go, go, go

Leather gloves and duct tape, whistles
Waterproof matches, and match-proof water
Blankies and ponchos and changes of clothes
A medical kit and a pocket knife

But

No one ever lists a box of cigars,
And a Wodehouse for reading by lamplight

I make my way through neon fury
Into a dizzying blur of heads
I think i see mountains in the distance
The darkness hides the concrete mounds from sight
Child imagination
For this night make them those mountains
From the time that your gait was free and your feet tiny

O Immortal night

Turn the gravel
Into the wistful green that cushioned my soles
Turn the amber of my room into a bonfire
let me look upon the city lights from the shelter of my tent

O Immortal night

Let Wodehouse laugh from beside my bed
And turn midnight fury into a wisp of smoke
Douse the embers of the day with the silver juice of the moon
While i rest at the root of the hibiscus that bloomed when i was ten

O immortal night
let me dip my quill and rejoice in the ink of your innocence
for the chatter of voices past fills my cave
from shelves they read out their favourite lines
as Blyton speaks to Shakespeare
and Dahl courts Woolf
their spirits high and their voices low

O immortal night
Let the tooth fairy knock on my door once again
Its been ages since i met her
Let the mystery of the future
Stir my soul
With millions of questions
Blind me with the succour of my faith

O immortal night
Lend me belief
In the sunlight of rhythm
While Belafonte spreads his warmth
Let the oil paints make a marble on my ceiling
And beckon to the stars
I am
Because you are

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

                           Trousers, Gentlemen, Trousers!

          “There are moments, Jeeves, when one asks oneself,
            'Do trousers matter?'"

            "The mood will pass, sir.”

                     ― P.G. Wodehouse, The Code of the Woosters

Had you visited the post office today
You might have heard an elderly man say
(After opening his newspaper, by the way)

“Trousers, gentlemen, trousers”

For there in black and white, on the front page
Was pictured each and every schoolboard sage
Attired in shorts, in deference to the age

“Trousers, gentlemen, trousers”

While one appreciates our volunteers
Who serve our schools for free (let’s give them cheers)
The vision of old men’s legs must lead to jeers

Their veined and wrinkled knees – is this a tease?
“Trousers, gentlemen, trousers – please!”

Narcosis wafts on the air
Pollinating the senses
Spreading dust on the years
Softening corners and edges
Disguising shapes
Until there is no point anymore
Nothing clear to be seen
But something pierced the skin

Wrecked witless and reckless
I have walked here all my days
In this land of rant and cant
Home of the brave and me
And I, the sentimental fool
Would keep the dream alive
Of gentle Wodehouse summers
And a myth of Christmas snow
Victorian values

Daylight is brighter here
So bright it laughs for joy
Dapple-dancing and doting
With no thought of cloud or rain
Not one word of unpleasant truth
No hint of hypocrisy
Here in Narcosis England
Everything is fine

                            By Phil Roberts

Narcosis wafts on the air
Pollinating the senses
Spreading dust on the years
Softening corners and edges
Disguising shapes
Until there is no point anymore
Nothing clear to be seen
But something pierced the skin

Wrecked witless and reckless
I have walked here all my days
In this land of rant and cant
Home of the brave and me
And I, the sentimental fool
Would keep the dream alive
Of gentle Wodehouse summers
And a myth of Christmas snow
Victorian values

Daylight is brighter here
So bright it laughs for joy
Dapple-dancing and doting
With no thought of cloud or rain
Not one word of unpleasant truth
No hint of hypocrisy
Here in Narcosis England
Everything is fine

                            By Phil Roberts

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

                                 A Prisoner’s Modest Dream

Some humorist on parade: “When the war is over…I’m going to buy a German and keep him the garden and count him.”

                    -Wodehouse in a German detention camp,
     quoted in Frances Donaldson’s P. G. Wodehouse: A Biography

When this is all over I pray for us
To sit in in my yard in some cheap Wal-Mart chairs
Each of us with a beer and a cigar
We could talk about the joys of fresh air

We could talk about our families and our work
And air-conditioning, and our home addresses
No longer A-43-Upper or B-24-Lower
We could sing about the Day of Jubilee

And give our voices and our lives to God
And there wouldn’t ever be a head count

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

                  Chuck Lorre is Shakespeare with a Laptop

Chuck Lorre is Shakespeare with a laptop
Bill Prady is Wodehouse at a whiteboard
Their Pasadena is the Forest of Arden
Or Totleigh Towers at a city bus stop

They have built for us an unfallen world
Of Woosterian plots and app-crossed lovers
At play in the laboratories of the Lord
Where the magic works but the elevators don’t

Chuck and Bill’s stories are always well-wrought
And they end each one with a provocative thought


(Nothing rhymes with “l’envoi.”)