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A piece of drift wood I am
In the sea of fate
Under the storms of life
And in the world of men

A piece of drift wood I am
Floating without reason
Tossed around by waves
Whipped by the ongoing storm

A piece of drift wood I am
Saw the sun on the horizon
Mesmerized, a goal was found
Hoping waves drift me to my beloved

But I was just a mere drift wood
Without control of his fate
The sun had set, while I am still adrift
In the sea, under the storm, in the world of men
created: 29/03/2018
last revised: 01/08/2023
Nat Lipstadt Oct 2023
The “little” Art I Possess

~writ for, inspired by, and warmly dedicated to
Kelly Rose Saccone~

“So an artist does…They say that often when you fill your walls with art you often forget it’s there and you don't absorb its beauty, but I enjoy what little art I have everyday. Sometimes it is just the color or the passion that hits me anew when I look at them.”
KRS

<~>

long ago the new~knowledge,
“newlodge” came brewing~infusing me;
art was not capable of being possessed

my reversal~eyes opened
the senses over~fulfilling,
body sensations brimming,

for I was the container,
only in temporary possession!

the art, in whatever the day’s chameleon guise,
is the professor-possessor, I am the missionary~emissary
remaindered by-product,
just
the vassal~vessel

when to gaze upon a poem~creation of years ago,
my expected mistakes appeared, a wee pride,
largesse of satisfaction, but these are frailties,
weaknesses, human misperceptions,
human ill-delusions!

never

ever was a poem among my possessions,
it was “in-sighted” within me
what was placed in my cupboard,
stored by my sensual conduits,
mine only to covey, not to covet,

art that tempest resides in as part,
a parcel in of the entirety of your body+soul composition,
but “out for delivery,”
seeded, stored & carry~birthed, given forth,
in a completed quantity
that’s so grand,
it takes five senses to truly comprehend!

it is pieces, a child of you,
recombinant,
you the birth sac,
how could ever be assessed as merely

little?

you are better understood to be a translator,
a temp~progenitor,
taking what all of nature and human experience
has installed on your inner walls, and then dispatched,
by you, gestated and unhesitatingly dispatched,

and when gift unwrapped from the plain brown paper of
our now orphaned belly skin,
it is to be hallelujah greeted,
for you, artist, translator, poem~mother,
have done you job, hallowed and sacrosanct,
and now the renewed giant emptiness,
will soon,
needy to be refilled, and
retransmitted once more:

this is no little, limited, mean feat,
your gifting is
beyond any words that limit,
no size constrains,
no words,
neither sufficient and insufficient,
you, are in loco parentis,
you’ve take what you/we are given,
beyond sizing,
and it seizes and is seized,
until you give it away
completed

and that is the grandest art .
inseminated within you,
true artistry!




7:42am
Fri Oct 27
2023
Nat Lipstadt Oct 2023
“What can a poem do?”
—————————-


”A poem
is a not a tourniquet
when you’re bleeding.
It’s not water when you’re thirsty
or food when you’re hungry.
A poem can’t protect you from an airstrike,
or from abduction, or from hate.
It’s hard to write when our words feel
like they’re not enough—they can’t do
the real, tangible work of saving lives,
or making people safer.”

(see (1) Maggie Smith)

<~>

as is my wont,
I write,
as is my Natted~inhabited,
retiring to the local watering holes of
Cerebrum & Cerebellum,
them regular haunts,
where all requests are mailed, processed, satisfied & marked;
‘return & render to the sender, who’s on a cerebral ******!’
and that request?

‘give me the words’ (2)

those ‘to do’ words, floaters, direct to top of list,
those ‘can do’ words, that can effect the affect,
spare the despair, realize the fungible, concretize cures,
soften hard waters, giving a worsening worn life fabric a
curated baby blanket feel, a 4-ply human tissue of

‘words that tell me everything’ (2)

salve solution verbs that bounty-wipe spills in entirety,
vacuum up spillage spoiling of 17 days of terrible nouns,
uncovered-unknown rages caused by inflicting prepositions
released a hatred rising,
safety rebury it deeper, drug & destruct the sleeper agents,
and let me start over again with

‘telling me everything by saying nothing’ (2)

the pausal silence, the quieted spaces tween the heartbeats,
where ‘reflection,’
the noun,
and its world of alternations,
reflection,
the noun,
look inwards, but shining outward,
this, this!
is where the poem goes to do!
enervating & arresting

its contradictory powers
rock you into wild docility,
possessive and submissive,
contradictory interferences,
smoothing the roughness,
closing the gaps it opens,
healing the caused truthful cuts,
with words that tell you
everything and nothing,
open the holes, filling the gaps,
that is what a
poem do,
in and by
the manner it is spoken…

<~>

“Sometimes a poem is the stone you carry in your pocket—the one you rub when you’re worried.  Let’s fill our pockets with poems.”
(see (1) Maggie Smith)
(1) Maggie Smith Oct. 24
(see link https://open.substack.com/pub/maggiesmith/p/what-can-a-poem-do

(2) see the lyrics  to”In a  Manner of Speaking”
  Oct 2023 Nat Lipstadt
Smoke Scribe
my sally my Sally

a wonderful double entendre
for it’s time,
my internal clock chiming

to sally forth and give the due
to where dew in her garden resides,
poetry becoming sweet tears
in all our eyes
when the philipina rain thirst quests our quenching

there is no reason no request for
this sally poem but a tickling thought suggests that a good friday. could be the trigger, or that
pandora bringing me Ave Maria as I compose
when
the due and the dew and the do are a
trinity

the best poems are the un-requested  but the most needed,
the most holy
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