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

                         Our Fearless Leaders / Have Got / The Shot

But as for us, well, we have not

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

                            First Communion in the Virus-Time

                                                For Veronica

                                           True Ikon of the Lord

A little girl’s mantilla is a crown
A crown an empress might covet for herself
Wore she not her own First Communion mantilla
Forever within the recesses of her heart

A little girl’s white cotton dress is a robe
A royal robe of courtly majesty,
Worn in the presence of her Lord and King

A little ******* First Communion day
Awes even the angels in her imperium

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


                            Reading is a Suspicious Activity:
                                Blue-Penciled in Solovetsky

   “…Soviet writers failed to write about their personal thoughts.”

                                               -Yevtushenko

Reading is a suspicious activity
Unless it’s a technical book of instructions
Or a hunting magazine with centerfolds
Of seductive semi-automatics

Writing is a forbidden activity
Unless it’s a grocery shopping list
Or the code to a new computer game
Of zombie valkyries with ******* tats

They’ve only gotten as far as statues thrown down
They’ll destroy the libraries next – and maybe you

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

                               Washing-Machine Archaeology

History passes, and so do washing machines
Rattling and spinning to the end of their span
Their dutiful cleanings cleaned out at last
Whited sepulchers around silent drums

The householder as Howard Carter finds
Behind a dead machine “Yes, wonderful things!”
Clothes hangers, metastasized dust bunnies
Inexplicable stains that hiss and spit

And in a midden, he discovers with a shock -
Almost embalmed – that famous long-lost sock!

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

          The Feast of Saint Stephen as Observed at the Truck Stop

                            On the occasion of meeting a friend
                         for breakfast on the Feast of St. Stephen

Now the overpass looked down
On the Feast of Stephen
With some garbage strewn around
Moldy and uneven
Brightly shone the neon light
Though the frost was cruel
When a poor man came in sight
Pumping diesel fuel

(This is gonna be one of the Greats, eh!)

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

                             Christmas Day in the Covid-Time

There are no children around the tree this year
To make Christmas complete with their happiness
No Barbie dolls, electric trains, or bikes -
We are distanced in everything but love

No relatives come and go, not even the one
Who will park his pickup truck on the lawn
No fruitcakes given and received, no hugs -
We are distanced in everything but love

But still there is the fire, the dog, and us -
We are distanced in everything but love

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

                                    Christmas Eve Eve Eve

Winter arrives, they say, at 8:31
And how do they know? The light doesn’t change
The soft pale light filtering through the fog
Upon the grey-brown fields who have fallen asleep

While we speak of lockdowns and rollbacks and deaths
And plan for the least-attended Christmas Mass
The fields and forests hardly speak at all
Only in their prayerful whispers of the Eternal

Time is  told to us by the sun, moon, and stars -
And all the seasons arrive in God’s good time

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

        Everyone Writes a Drivelly Poem about the Winter Solstice
                                           And entitles it
                                         “Winter Solstice,”
                           And yet Somehow the World Goes On

The sun seems to stand still, and too, the world
An Ouroboros of lockdowns and masks
And the increasing divisions of partisans
In yet another republic devouring itself

There is an insubstantial Christmas truce
Undeclared, a catching of breath and will
In hopes that two-faced Janus will close his doors
Against the failings of the coming year

The sun seems to stand still, and too, the world
We also wait, and search the skies for a Star

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

                Bifocalism for the Masses and, Like, Stuff

Bifocals – the upper lens sees far away
The sun and the moon and the dancing stars
All in their appointed places above
Great mountains and oceans and thunderstorms

Bifocals – the lower lens sees the end of your nose
The sweep hand dancing around your Timex watch
The book you are reading, the book you are writing
Your thoughts encoded in orderly lines

Bifocals – both lenses balance your sense of vision -
But take the stairs with care and precision!

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

                       And He Liked Really Cool Cars

                                 For George Ebarb

                                Of happy memory

                  Who served God, his family, prisoners,
                  And all who were blessed in knowing him
                  With unfailing love and generosity

                 (And he liked really cool cars!)

A convention is to say that when we die
God will not ask us about the cars we drove
But we may hope and pray that in George’s case
A happy exception was made for him