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Lawrence Hall Nov 2018
(A MePhone rattles and twanks and pings like Robby-the-Robot gone bad.)

Woman: “Yeah?”

(silence)

Woman: “YEAH?”

(silence)

Woman: “I’m in the hospital.”

Noise from MePhone: (think Charlie Brown’s parents)

Woman: “I’m in the hospital!”

MePhone: (Charlie Brown’s parents)

Woman: “I’M IN THE HOSPITAL!”

MePhone: (a small child babbling)

Woman: “I’M IN THE HOSPITAL!”

MePhone: (a small child babbling)

Woman: “YEAH!”

MePhone: (a small child babbling)

Woman: “YEAH!”

MePhone: (incoherent noises – could be a ******)

Woman: “FOR MY COLONOSCOPY!”

MePhone: (the ****** continues)

Woman: “FOR MY COLONOSCOPY!”

Offstage, a young woman in scrubbies: “Mr. Lawrence…?”

(Deo gratias)

Exit, pursued by Too Much Information.
Lawrence Hall Sep 2019
Lunch at Denny’s

With a Side Disorder of Screaming Child and Bellowing Mother


Pajama Child, running and screaming: “Bye-bye. Bye-Bye! BYE-BYE! HEY!!! BYE-BYE!!!!”

Momma, not looking up from her MePhone: “Don’t run, honey. No. Don’t run! I SAID, ‘DON’T RUN!!!”

Pajama Child, standing in her seat and chewing her food over diners’ backs: “Wlb. Glb. Blrt! Uerk! Blye-blye!

Momma, not looking up from her MePhone:: “One…!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!­!!!!!!”

Pajama Child: “NO! CAN’T MAKE ME! NO, YOU! NO, NO, NO, NO!!!!!!!!”

Momma, not looking up from her MePhone: “Twoooooooooooooooooooooooooo…!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Pajama Child, throwing food: (SHRIEKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK!!!!!!!!!!!!”)

Momma, not looking up from her MePhone: “NO! I MEAN IT THIS TIME! One………!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Pajama Child, running and screaming around the restaurant: “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!

Momma, not looking up from her MePhone: “Twooooooooooooooo…!!!! I mean it this time!!!! Twooooooooooooooooooo…!!!!!!”

Pajama Child: “NO, YOU! CAN’T MAKE ME! BYE-BYE! BYE-BYE-BYE!”

Momma, not looking up from her MePhone: “Do you need a spanking? I mean it this time!”



I blame the teachers and Donald Trump. I mean it. No, really.  I mean it this time.
Your ‘umble scrivener’s site is: Reactionarydrivel.blogspot.com

It’s not at all reactionary, tho’ it might be drivel.

Lawrence Hall’s vanity publications are available on amazon.com as Kindle and on bits of dead tree:  THE ROAD TO MAGDALENA, PALEO-HIPPIES AT WORK AND PLAY, LADY WITH A DEAD TURTLE, DON’T FORGET YOUR SHOES AND GRAPES, COFFEE AND A DEAD ALLIGATOR TO GO, and DISPATCHES FROM THE COLONIAL OFFICE.
Lawrence Hall Apr 2017
The Social MePhone Justice Commandos of Toxic Doom

In the unending quest for social justice
Schoolroom shootings, unisex bakeries
Tornados, a steak, a snake, get off the plane
They’re all the same to the Omigod cult:

“Omigod Omigod Omigod O
Migod Omigod Omigod Omi
God Omigod Omigod Omigod
Omigod Omigod Omigod O!

“Chapsnat bookface tubeyou my relationship
It’s complicated Omigod Omi”
Lawrence Hall Jul 12
Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                        “Is That MePhone Surgically Attached to you?”


“Is that thing surgically attached to you?” the teacher sighed.

“You can’t talk to me like that!” the MePhone replied.
As an adjunct faculty instructor of no status whatsoever at a pretty good little community college I found that the thirty-something adult students were far more tiresome in this matter than the dual-credit high school kids.
Lawrence Hall Nov 2022
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

Amateur Storm Chasers Do Voice-Overs for Their MePhone Videos

Oh my God
Oh my God
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh my God!
Are you *ing me?
Are you *
ing me!?
Oh my God
Oh my God
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh my Goddddddddddddd!
Oh my God
Oh my God
Oh my God
Oh my God
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh my God!
Are you **ING ME!?
Oh my God
Oh my God
Oh my God
Oh my God
Oh my God
Oh my God!
Oh my God
Oh my God
Lawrence Hall May 2021
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

              Graduation Speech Soup – Simply Stir and Serve

Keep the torch alive to pass to a new generation with the key that unlocks the road to the future follow your passion the unemployment will follow woo-hoo we’ve been through some amazing times together make a difference to thine own self be true woo-hoo commencement means a beginning not an ending woo-hoo as we go forth life is a journey not a destination we made it all the hard work we’ve put forth to this point in time these are the best time in our lives as one door closes another door opens because a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step to make the world a better place trust your instincts you don’t find education in books we are the future bright with promise some see the future and ask why but we see the future and ask why not Habakkuk 2:7 woo-hoo we did it I can’t believe we’re here believe in yourself live your dreams to be all that you can be as a famous man John Kennedy once said God has a plan for you woo-hoo we have the responsibility to build a new world if opportunity doesn’t know build a door don’t follow the path blaze a trail because there is no one like you because you are an individual just like those other hundred or so people your age and all dressed just alike because life is what happens while you’re making plans woo-hoo live, laugh, love you have to look through the rain to see the rainbow dance like nobody’s looking (even though they are, and they’re laughing at you) aim for the moon and if you miss you’ll hit the moon (or something) life is not waiting for the storm to pass it’s about dancing in the rain because you are a new generation called to miss 100% of the shots you don’t take because we were all one big family who have lived, laughed, and loved together hey and remember the time (name) barfed on the stairs we’ll all that that shared moment to remember together woo-hoo we can’t save all the starfish but I can make a difference for this one because as a great man Robert Frost said in “The Road Not Taken” we can make a difference for all the starfish in the sea of life woo-hoo today is the first day of your rest of your life oh, the places you’ll go like maybe eternal stasis in front of a MePhone I don’t know why they asked me to be the speaker shout-out to Mom wear sunscreen because your future’s so bright close your eyes and remember when hey, an air horn, that’s so cool, no one’s ever done that before woo-hoo I want to congratulate each and every one of you on your incredible talents and abilities as you begin your journey to a bright and shining future because we are the best class (name of school and a shout-out to the mascot) has ever graduated (since last year) woo-hoo a dream is a wish your heart makes and you can become anything you dream to be or wish to be or something #lifehack #hashtag now go forth and make your lives exceptional woo-hoo although on Monday morning we’ll wake up and realize we’re just more unemployed Americans.
One longs for a world free of speeches.
Lawrence Hall Aug 2018
-headline

          And how can man die better
          Than facing fearful odds,
          For the ashes of his fathers,
          And the temples of his gods

                         -Macauley, Lays of Ancient Rome

An argument over a parking space –
Lest all the pink Chinese flip-flops are gone
Triple-wide thongs in naughty, frothy lace
And a rhinestone case for a new MePhone

Cartoon shirts from the Vietnamese, sippy cups
Nicaraguan underwear and funny hats
Squeaky plastic toys for the little pups
And genuine autographed tee-ball bats -

There are causes for which a man might die
But “Ten Percent Off!” is no battle cry
Your ‘umble scrivener’s site is:
Reactionarydrivel.blogspot.com.
It’s not at all reactionary, tho’ it might be drivel.
Lawrence Hall Jan 2018
Is the End Near for Religion?

-news item

No one will ever acknowledge a MePhone
As the Lord of the universe, or as
The Creator from before created time
Born of an IBM Selectric

True plastic of true limited resources,
Sing Advent hymns unto an Apple II,
Whisper aves on a strand of transistors,
Or genuflect before a Model T

No consecration will ever obtain
Upon the altar of a microchip
Lawrence Hall Jun 2017
A Necktie for Fathers' Day

Roaming around lost in the 1970s
Dull advertising writers still forbid
The purchase of neckties for Fathers’ Day –
As if  DNA ever wears a tie

It’s all knee-pants and advertising now
On cartoon tees and baseball caps and sneaks
Admiring his tattoos in his MePhone
And cadging guy-support from his live-in

While watching his collection of action films:
“I’ll look for a job tomorrow, babe, okay?”
Lawrence Hall Oct 2019
Mr. Big Businessman...

                       There wiste no wight that he was in dette

                          -Chaucer, General Prologue, line 279

If this were fifty years ago he’d sport
A cheap brown suit and a loud, too-wide tie
But now he wears knee-pants and cartoon tees
And fashion shoes that look like cancerous growths

And speaks like Chaucer’s merchant of his gigs
Contacts and contracts and deals to be made
Important ‘phone calls that must be taken now
In a voice of in-crowd guffawery

But when he clicks off his shiny MePhone
He asks for gas money to get him home
Your ‘umble scrivener’s site is: Reactionarydrivel.blogspot.com

It’s not at all reactionary, tho’ it might be drivel.

Lawrence Hall’s vanity publications are available on amazon.com as Kindle and on bits of dead tree:  THE ROAD TO MAGDALENA, PALEO-HIPPIES AT WORK AND PLAY, LADY WITH A DEAD TURTLE, DON’T FORGET YOUR SHOES AND GRAPES, COFFEE AND A DEAD ALLIGATOR TO GO, and DISPATCHES FROM THE COLONIAL OFFICE.
Ottar Mar 2014
memorize
by rote,
what you wrote,
take a note to,
                      jog the mind,
                            the mind,
                                a minefield
                             or is it yours?
don't bother
to memorize
anything, anymore,
                                  evermore (there is he raven, again)
                                   evermore,
the world is at
the disposal of
your opposable
thumbs, fabulous phablets,
mephone, myphone and iphone,
costs more time
to memorize,
but what a
surprise when it will
be gone,
as someone will
find out how to pull the plug.
              how to pull the plug,
                                                evermore
                                                 evermore (what is he raven about this
                                                                                                      time?)    
Trust your mind,
until you are too old to
remember when you
started forgetting,
that you never smoked,
but today would be
a good day to smoke a
cigar, and between,
distasteful puffs and the exhaled
cloud, is a fog to the mosquitoes
of spring, you spout scripture,
from the mind - mouth connection,
while expectantly looking up heaven
word for direction, because, still my
beating heart there is faith, in your memory,
not in your fingertips trying to
reach out and under
                       stand,
technology.
now if I could remind myself to memorize more often...aw forget about it.
Lawrence Hall May 2019
A grown man in knee-pants and a cartoon tee
Flip-flopping along in his shower shoes
His hands up in surrender as he runs
A MePhone in his left, water bottle in his right

Nasaling “OmyGod! OmyGod! OmyGod!”
It’s his all-purpose whining upspeak chant
Wailed out for any grade less than an A
Or for a kitty-cute MeTube video

And now for a campus shooting: “Why me!?”
I just didn’t think it would happen here!”


(cf. Goethe, The Sorrows of Young Werther)
Your ‘umble scrivener’s site is:
Reactionarydrivel.blogspot.com.
It’s not at all reactionary, tho’ it might be drivel.

Lawrence Hall’s vanity publications are available on amazon.com as Kindle and on bits of dead tree:  The Road to Magdalena, Paleo-Hippies at Work and Play, Lady with a Dead Turtle, Don’t Forget Your Shoes and Grapes, Coffee and a Dead Alligator to Go, and Dispatches from the Colonial Office.
Lawrence Hall Sep 2019
A Harvey Refugee Reports:

When she with cats, papers, a change of clothes
And her old college bag to hold them all
Was one refugee among others in a dump truck
A Houston Airport Authority dump truck

Dieseling through rain and water and fear
With muck and mud sloshing across their feet
A woman next to her then laughed and said,
“Now we’re the people they take pictures of”

But there was no Capa to frame the scenes
Only oh-my-Godders with MePhone screens
As the old saying goes, this isn't half the story. A young person of my acquaintance was caught in the flooding in Houston two years ago because she trusted her local government and the dam (and ****') authority when they told the people not to evacuate because they would only clog the roads.
Lawrence Hall Apr 2018
In Mixed Meter, A Meditation Upon Alarm Clocks:


The healing sleep of which Macbeth spoke enviously…

SHATTERED!

The metal ////cans kicked across the room
A giant light fixture hurting my face
Because I thought a top rack a safer space
Large men yelling things my mother would not approve:

“REVEILLE! REVEILLE! REVEILLE!
RISE AND SHINE, AND GREET THE NEW DAY!
LET GO YER ////S AND GRAB YER SOCKS!
GET OFF YER LAZY ///ES YA SORRY SQUIRRELS!”

A hundred and sixty bare feet hit the deck
In perfect Navy unison at 03-my-God-is-this-real-00

And somehow, all these many years later
The soft ding-**** of a tiny MePhone
Sounds even worse
Lawrence Hall Nov 2022
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com
LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
Fellowship & Fairydust (fellowshipandfairydust.com)
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                          Tumbrils Rattling Ideas to Their Deaths


“Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire.”

                              -attributed to Gustav Mahler
   (But no one sources the quote so maybe it’s from someone else)


That which is good is now tumbriled through the streets
The carter following the map upon his MePhone
Or rather the map upon their MePhone
Now that one man must not, dare not be he

That which is true is stood upon the gallows
It may tweet aloud for a moment or two
But weighted down with the burdens of trends
It must immediately be ****** up short

That which is beautiful is burnt as fuel -
All sacrificed to Moloch, loving and cruel
Lawrence Hall May 2021
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                          A Fugitive in His Haunted Night

A police car parked in front of the house
They say there’s a fugitive in the woods
Bailed out of his truck on a county road
Abandoning his girlfriend to be nabbed

Well, poor man, he’s lost his truck and his girl
And gained mosquitoes, snakes, coyotes, heat
A fading MePhone signal, rain, rot, mud
And another three years in a white cotton suit

Why?

Perhaps, like many another poor soul
He lost his way while searching for elusive Truth
A poem is itself. The bale / bail spelling is an issue.
Lawrence Hall Sep 2021
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                     “Lawrence’s Apple Watch is Fully Charged”

Oh, sure, the MePhone is pleased to say that now
But long before the day spins down the watch
Percentages add up to little and so
I must find the magnetic sticky thing

The charger and the watch embrace with passion
You can almost see the electricity
That sparks their one-ness and their holy bond
Leaving my wrist empty and timeless for a time

“Lawrence’s Apple Watch is fully charged”
But reluctant to leave its charger for long
I love my Apple watch in every way except that it requires a recharge twice each day.
Lawrence Hall Nov 2021
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

  WHITE BREAD! I NEED SOME WHITE BREAD OVER HERE!

                            Pancake House on Crack Street II
        With a Chorus of One Cook in Need of Some White Bread

A cold and dreary morning along Easy Street
The comforts of coffee and cholesterol
The Senior Special two fresh eggs your way
Farm fresh bacon or sausages your way

I NEED SOME WHITE BREAD OVER HERE! WHITE BREAD!

Down-home hash brown potatoes your way
Whole wheat toast with farm fresh butter your way
Fresh brewed Colombian coffee your way
“I’ll be with you in a minute, honey, okay?”

OVER HERE! I NEED SOME WHITE BREAD OVER HERE!

There aren’t any newspapers anymore
“In a minute!” So I studied my MePhone

WHITE BREAD! I NEED SOME WHITE BREAD OVER HERE!

I don’t think the cook was yelling about me
I don’t know, of course

The beggar at the door shivered quietly
Pancake House on Crack Street II
Lawrence Hall Apr 2021
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                                   A Doom of Impending Sense

When you are driving away for the daily run
Of errands, appointments, disappointments
You know you’ll enjoy the company of your MePhone –

       Which you have left upon your desk at home

You buy a magazine in the checkout line
Or find a book in some cold waiting room
Or read an editorial in the local wipe
Or remember a poem from seventh grade

You glory in words, words and images dense
And feel a doom of near, impending sense
A poem is itself.
Lawrence Hall Jan 20
Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                                 Sailing a Couch into History

         We are not permitted to choose the frame of our destiny,
                           but what we put into it is ours.

                         -Dag Hammarskjold, Markings, p. 51

Through eating, fatting, sleeping, video games
En couchant in a stasis ossified
By the low expectations of the zeitgeist
(“What’s a zeitgeist?”) some flail into history

The ironic echoes of Call of Duty
Flatten against an empty ‘tater-chip bag        
Yesterday flung into the baby’s crib
(“Ain’t no one seen little Shawnee today?”)

His MePhone case is manly hunter green
He's checkin’ out the fantasies on a glowing screen
Lawrence Hall Mar 2022
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                                   The Bank That Used to Be

This temple dedicated to work and thrift
Is mostly empty now; its marble floors
Feature sticky yellow feet to keep
Errant capitalists away from each other

The offices are vacant; the lights are dim
A lonely teller in chemical-purple hair
And painted, rhinestoned, clawlike fingernails
Counts not deposits but her MePhone keys

There is no line along the yellow feet
Only one communicant with a deposit slip
Lawrence Hall Apr 2022
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                   Palm Sunday without Air-Raid Warnings

Palm Sunday is easy for the rest of us
A procession with palms from the parking lot
Praising God through an asphalt Jerusalem
A Subaru on His right hand, a Dodge on His left

Palm Sunday is easy for the rest of us
The front of the procession out of tune with the back
Or is it the other way around? Someone’s MePhone
Beeping during the Elevation - Catholics, eh

Palm Sunday is easy for the rest us -
No burning streets, no screaming wounded, no death
Lawrence Hall Jan 2021
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

            Drive-Through Covid Testing and Bladder Control

Just waiting in a car-queue, something new
Every hour up a hundred yards or so
Readings on the MePhone, a book or two
And good ol’ Morning Al on the radio

Clutch, go, brake, clutch, inches at a time, wait
News on the up hour, and news on the down
Scan the QR code, number, name, and date
For the nice lady in a mask and gown

Hold your head forward, now strike a pose
Then up my nose the little swabbie-thing goes…
Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

       That Which Does not Exist Will End in the Next Half Hour

The MePhone beeps and then reports
That the rain that isn’t falling
Will stop in the next half hour -
This may be a metaphor for life

And if not life, then ten to twenty
If the presiding judge is lenient
Weather reports can be a metaphor for life.
Lawrence Hall Jun 2022
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                                         CLASS OF 2022!!!!!!

            Free Food and Clothes on Tuesdays and Thursdays

“CLASS OF 2022!!!!!” is still painted on his pickup truck
Which is parked in front of Christian Outreach
Free food and clothes on Tuesdays and Thursdays
He’s got his MePhone and a box of stuff

Good to see a young man with a plan for his future
Lawrence Hall Jan 2021
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

           Soldiers Sleeping Beneath a Bust of Father Abraham

In the Capitol exhausted soldiers sleep
Beneath a bust of Abraham Lincoln
And a sign that reads: “Cameras and related gear
Not authorized in this area.”

After days of transports and formations
Of stringing wire and policing the area
Of orders and marches and lines for the head
And maintenance of all weapons and gear

They sprawl just any whichaway on a floor
To be mocked with sneaky MePhone photographs
“Is that all our overpaid soldiers do? Sleep?”
And stepped around by those whom they protect

Insolent civilians might not give a ****
But our soldiers are blessed by Father Abraham
Based on a photograph published in Drudge.

— The End —