Some say the world will end in fire;
some say in rain.
I’ve seen the world end
again and again.
I’ve heard the bell toll
and the raven talk.
I’ve walked to the end of the pier
and seen the boat crashed up on the rock.
But each time I arise,
I awake to face the dawn.
Because there’s always one more job to do,
while I whistle one more song.

Lawrence Hall
[email protected]  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                                         Ode on a Coffee Urn

                             If Keats Took His Morning Coffee
                         at Hub City Diner in Lafayette, Louisiana

Thou stainless steel bride of the day’s pale dawn
Thou foster-child of all our morning hopes
Patient historian who writes upon
The pages of our lives optimistic tropes:

What die-cut label hangs about thy shape
Of morning blends or sometimes darker roasts
From Jamaica’s Blue Mountain, or some further scape
Perhaps above Colombia’s green coasts

What men or gods are these who at Hub City can say
“What wonderful coffee for beginning the day!”

I'm craving something real,
something more surreal.
Wanting to get away,
from this ugly summer day.
Missing the fall, and the snow..
isn't that funny, don't you know?

Closing eyes, dreaming of other times.
Wanting to live back in the golden days.
Visioning a quest, something to put me
to the test.

Sparkling waters;
clock birds cuckoo once it strikes twelve.
Life of the moment, coming to an end-
as the birds nests make final amends.

Lawrence Hall
[email protected]  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                Darwinians Infected with Cognitive Dissonance
                            Visit Gettysburg on July 5th, 1863

They consider the news in several editions
Ignore the diagnoses of learned physicians
Number the dead at the local morticians

And conclude:

“They must have had pre-existing conditions”

I the lonely meadowlark
Perched upon the thistle
Waiting the sickled mower to pass

I the cracked egg
Fetal heart slowing, slowing
Death before the hatchling birth

I the hare crouchant
Scarce aware the shadow’s dive
Screeching beneath the talons

I the wind-torn tree
Branches scattered, bleeding sap
Beetles explore the shredded bark

I the fawn uncertain
Edging the splattered highway
Mother shattered in the lane

Lawrence Hall
[email protected]  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                                 Cardiac Clinic Consulting Room

One’s bubble goes off-bubble a few degrees
For now there is nothing to do but sit and wait
No longer in control of anything
“Is there in your family any history of…?”

Pleasant young people in scrubs come and go
With papers and charts and machines that buzz
And in between the book is open but unread
While silent morning light louvres across the walls

The doctor enters with paperwork and optimism:
There are still possibilities in life

Lawrence Hall
[email protected]  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                 A Brief and Self-Indulgent Morning Offering

Dear Lord,

Thank you for this day
I ask you that I may
Pray it
Play it
And
Work it
Most to your pleasure
To the pleasure of those whom I love
To the pleasure of everyone I meet today
Rather more for me that you did yesterday
(but we’ll say nothing more about that)
And nothing for Satan
‘Cause he’s an ***

Lawrence Hall
[email protected]  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

              A Poor Attempt at a Kinda-Sorta Tang Quatrain

Ink fluttering across cheap notebook pages
A candle guttering across a thousand nights
In exile he finds a school of poets and sages
Far from his home along the swift Mekong