Lawrence Hall
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Dispatches for the Colonial Office

                                    Lady Macbeth and a Luna Moth

A luna moth is elegant in her green
Like Ellen Terry as Lady Macbeth
Beautiful and yet somehow sinister
Those wing’ed eyes – they seem to look at us

Eyes

That measure you for a dagger or a cup
She clings to a lichened brick wall at night
Wings pulsing against that wall, waiting, waiting…
Suddenly wild flutterings as she flees into the dark!

Exit, pursued by a cat

Lawrence Hall
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Dispatches for the Colonial Office

        Why Do Widows Give Me Their Late Husbands’ Clothes?

When old men die their widows give me their clothes
(The old men’s clothes; not the widows’; let’s not get weird)
Nice pullover shirts, expensive blazers, everything goes
And ties to the 1970s geared

I am as Bob Newhart lost in an age
Of tattered tees and designer sneaks
Hardly the attire of a wise old sage
One of the last sartorial antiques

When old men die their widows give me their clothes
I look quite natty in them, I suppose

(The old men’s clothes, not the widows; let’s not get weird)

Lawrence Hall
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Dispatches for the Colonial Office

                                           Time to Walk Away


            Sometimes I think people were meant to be strangers

                               -Rod McKuen, Stanyan Street


V: I don’t know who you are

R: You know.

V: Not enough.

R: Enough.

V: Who are you?

R: I will miss you.

V: Are you going away?

R: Yes.

V: Why?

R: You asked me who I am.

A     n acrostic
C     an be challenging
R     efining words into patterns
0      f different meanings
S     o we can see the world
T     o be open to new ways of seeing
I       f we've a mind to
C      onsider it so

Lawrence Hall
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Dispatches for the Colonial Office

          Street Snatches, Unmarked Cars, No Badges, No Warrants:
                                    It’s Okay – We’re a Republic


     No one was more astonished than they when what they’d been
     talking of for years suddenly took on reality.

                                     ― C.S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength


If thugs in masks ambush you in the street
And tell you they’re the police – you must believe them
Hoodies and ball caps and baggy old clothes
Handcuffed and pushed into an unmarked car

It’s okay – we’re a republic

One of the officers arranges her hair
Fairy Hardcastle wants to look pretty
And you?
Gone in two minutes and 46 seconds
Disappeared somewhere in Louisiana

It’s okay – we’re a republic

We can’t be sure if you’re guilty or not -
Our silence is the only guilt we know

But it’s okay – we’re a republic

Lawrence Hall
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Dispatches for the Colonial Office

                      All of Us Look for Magic in Our Books

All of us look for magic in our books
A sale-table paperback during a coffee break
Is a voyage beyond the vending machines
A light at dawn on the first day in Eden

But we must bring our magic to the magic
Or good King Arthur will not come again
The Shire will remain befouled and desolate
And morning will not bring us noble knights

For we must bring our magic to the magic
Which will not happen if we don’t believe

Lawrence Hall
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Dispatches for the Colonial Office

                                  Good Neighbors Make Good Fences


                                         As Robert Frost did not say


I’d like to know

What pocket knife he carries for his daily chores
The pen with which he writes his shopping lists
The poetry he reads when out of doors
And how he really feels about September mists

But beyond all that, I want no knowledge of
His first marriage, the price of his new car
Which direction he faces when making love
The distance from here to the second nearest star

Because

A more important distance is that between friends
Slightly obscure through a diffuser lens