A collection by Lawrence “Mack in Texas” Hall (PG)
Draining the Blood of Humans at Twilight
“A powerful monster // living down
in the darkness growled // in pain…”
-Beowulf, Burton Raffel translation
In the sinister dusk // they seek our blood
A ghastly enemy // of disgusting thirst
Stealing up from the swamp // and primordial mud –
Well, we stole their habitat // – mosquitoes were here first!
Blue Moon and a Spooky Old Tree
To watch the moonrise is almost liturgical
Her bright silver light behind the far-off pines
Rising and glowing and larger and larger
Silent and silver, lifting above the woods
I set a camera to watch Moon through the night
Electronics see the night and light differently
The old apple tree appears white and skeletal
And ghosts pretending to be insects flit about
Moon and trees and ghosts when left alone
Make merry mischief knowing that I am gone
Feeding the Squirrels and Birds at Dawn
A squirrel sits upon a little mound of corn
And faces the east with its nimble forepaws
Clasped gently together as if in prayer
Crawfish are not in the Bible
“…spawned in that slime / Conceived by a pair of those monsters / Born of Cain”
-From Beowulf, Burton Raffel’s fine translation
Eating crawfish is seasonally lawful
But I tell you true, they’re simply offal!
The Sunday Evening News in a Time of Elections
“Good things of day begin to droop and drowse,” –Macbeth III.ii.58
Suddenly the yellowing afternoon is still
For Indian Summer breezes have slipped away
While clouds of silent midges swirl against the sun
For reasons of nature known only to themselves
The treeline is blue as evening comes on
But the hayfields glow golden for a little while
Until Old Sol falls asleep at last
And the firstling stars come out to play
A rabbit shyly nibbles at the dewing grass –
The day is over; we have to let it pass
What Do Little ‘Possums Dream Of?
(I know, I know – Of What Do Little ‘Possums Dream?)
My resident ‘possum was curled up cozily
Deep down in a stump over by the fence
Asleep, and like a little dog or cat
A-twitching happily in his ‘possum dreams
Of dung-beetles and corpses of dead birds
Dog food left carelessly outside overnight
Whatever awful offal the cat yakked up –
A buffet of delicacies for well-brought-up marsupials
Crawly-bugs and poops and snails and rattlesnake tails
Those surely are what little ‘possums dream of
Old Mr. ‘Possum and the Moon
Old Mr. ‘Possum is a garbageman
Who quietly works his appointed nightly rounds
Unappreciated as he tidies this
And cleans up that, all without any fuss
The other animals don’t seem to like him much
For his wobbling, waddling walk, his untidiness
His pointy nose, his all-draggledy tail
And his awkward shape like a loaf of oaf
But when he lifts his eyes to the queen of the skies
He knows that to her he is a knight in disguise
Death Falls Apart in White
Snow does not fall in July, and yet there is white
White falling like large snowflakes or small flower petals
White scatterings across the summer lawn
Ghostly among the leafy sheltering oaks
The hawks are back
An egret about her business of bugs and snakes
Sudden violence high up in the gentle air
Flesh and life claw-ripped, torn, and devoured
Unheard below, only feathers falling like snow
The hawks are back
This artificial paradise of feeders and seeders
And flower-bordered lawn is a scape of death
From which the gentle rabbits, birds, and squirrels
Withdraw in silent fear
The hawks are back
The Apex Predator
“They…
Have watched me rise from the darkness of war
Dripping with my enemies’ blood”–Beowulf, trans. Raffel, lines 151-153
The apex predator feeds upon the flesh
Of those who wanted desperately to live
To hew and chew and gnaw and digest and mesh
With those who died with no desire to forgive
The apex predator feeds while others starve
The sentient flee from him in grievous fear
But he always wins, his victims then to carve
In bloody fields and haunted forests drear
War ends violently in drang und sturm
And the apex predator is obviously
The Worm
