Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                This is Your Shoulder-Fired, Gas-Operated,
                             Semi-Automatic Metaphor

In wars generals deploy sports metaphors
In sports coaches deploy war metaphors

Why are they being evasive about what they do?

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                     No One Writes Verse about the Precinct Dump

Look for the sign that reads PERCH TRAPS 4 SALE
After a hundred yards take the gravel road to the right
It’ll go down to this stagnant little creek
And that old bridge is stronger than it looks

Then up and to your left; you can’t miss it
Refrigerators and washers to your left a bit
As for the right, you just don’t want to know
But them buzzards today; they’re puttin’ on a show

There was this fat boy who used to work there
Made rhymes about garbage; must have been the air

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                             Earth, Water, Fire, Air, and You

                                  Cf. Shakespeare, Sonnet 45

Fire and air sound like a poetic cliché
A pastiche from half-remembered Elizabethans
Cut from Jonson or Marlowe, or Will himself
And pasted to a puerile plaint of love

But there is a reality in fantasy
And you are the fantasy in reality
There are swift messengers of fire and air
And you are sender, signal, and recipient

Fire and air only sound like a cliché
For you are truth, truth clothed in splendid array

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                      The World is Ending Tonight!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The world is ending tonight! We read it on The Q!
My people are saved, but I’m not sure about you!

The world is ending tonight! We need dried beans!
Cases of toilet paper and some wipey-cleans!

I need some more bullets for my AR gun!
We’ll defend our bottled water; you ain’t gettin’ none!

The world is ending tonight! We’ll be hydrated!
But you’ll die dry; you hadn’t oughter waited!

Sunspots are flaring out from Satan’s maw!
Not to mention lies told by Satan’s paw!

This hasn’t happened since 1854!
When this sinful world was destroyed before!

Oh, yes, our loving God is a-callin’ us home!
Except for them Jews and them sons of Rome!

We’ll all fly to Heaven on the northern lights!
Except for you unbelievers; you ain’t got no rights!

The world is ending tonight! Ash and ember!
(And don’t forget to vote for Trump in November!)

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                                     Dull Substance Indeed!

                                   Cf. Shakespeare, Sonnet 44

When we are young we are like airy spirits
Smooth and lean and lithe, strong in limb and hope
Earth, water, air, and fire sustain our flights
Beyond all time, beyond the weight of substance dull

But with age, even the stars grow heavy and dim
The orders four of all created things
Burden our love with distances and walls
Pulling us down, wrecking our happy dreams

I cannot run to you, I cannot fly
And yet I know you’re here, in my poor mind’s eye

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                                 Submitting a Ballot Blank


                                   “Obey me and be free!”

                          -Patrick McGoohan’s The Prisoner


Feel free to submit a ballot blank
To ignore all those rotten cabbages in rows
We have only ourselves to thank
That our party leaders are Rolex-rich pharaohs

Feel free to submit a ballot blank
The parties’ incompetent choices need not be ours
Forced upon us through caucuses dark and dank
Let us assert our constitutional powers

When they issue us ballots bearing no real choice
We will return them just as empty  -
          That will be our silent, powerful voice

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                          Our Fair Lady Moon is Jealous of You

                                         Cf. Shakespeare, Sonnet 43

I see you best when I see you in my dreams
By day my vision is distracted and dull
But at night you are brighter than moonbeams
And among all the darkness brighter still

At noon you are a shadow in the glaring sun
But in the night you are the brightest light
Our Fair Lady Moon is jealous of you
And stars vie with each other to complete your crown

Maybe a vision in the day is not what it seems -
I see you best when I see you in my dreams