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  Aug 2024 Nat Lipstadt
Sally A Bayan
Most of us grew up believing
that after death is when one  
gets to face heaven or hell;
but, as the earth gets older,
people's eyes and minds
change with the times, turning
deeper, coming up with various
analyses and conclusions.

Some fight for what they think,
that there already exists
heaven and hell here on earth.
to experience any of the two,
we......don't have to die.

While here on earth, we see
and live...we experience
the good and the bad, and
whatever is in between; we
breathe a mix of fresh and
stale air...survive countless
hardships, physical, mental
and emotional struggles,
are we already being
rewarded, maybe being
punished, for whatever
we deserve?

At this point, i remember
my folks words:  reward
and punishment starts
here on earth, while we still
breathe and have lucid minds
to identify the colors of our
past actions and decisions,
were they right or wrong?


sally b

© Rosalia Rosario A. Bayan
August 29, 2024
Nat Lipstadt Aug 2024
A single lyric on a single song, sung, by one of my chosen ones, a brother and friend,
a brethren, whose hidden meanings are never hidden from me,
as we both, both gentle souls who, when lost, have been
lost
witnesses and also been witnessed:
weeping into the rags of remorse

this season is nearing conclusion, I know the sun rays penetrate, in a vain vanity of a last attempt to purify and make my soul stains,
a burnt offering, rising as smoke up to the wind,
my hearted words lifted,
letter by letter, to whence they came from

My senses are not cold, rhymes run, forgiving the sun for it’s inevitable disappearance, so it shall be displaced,
just lie us,
over then under, a nearby horizon,
with a sunset wave goodbye, a multi colored coat spectacle,
that reflects well off & on
my pallid skin

When it returns, it will be a different star, re-angled, in such a way that it can no longer do heavens work on my body and soul, both
kindred entities, each with each other,
a commemorative tree ring commonality,
a newly incised cain mark

sensitive locomotives ply between the sides of my head, knowing better than most the true meaning of fleeting, for although I am in my eighth decade now, and those words,
“there is nothing new under the sun,”
ring inherent inside like
they too newly born
 but,
running on a track well worn,
now nearly scrap iron

yet clothed in my sinner’s wet rags, the remorse ever lingers,
directed to mine own mark of Cain,
awaiting the day when the sun touches my
forehead, and those loco- motives ride higher,
for their denouement, their untying(2)

Aug 30 2024
fini 2:17 pm
by the Sound
(1) The Window Lyrics by Leonard Cohen

[Verse 1]

Why do you stand by the window?
Abandoned to beauty and pride
The thorn of the night in your *****
The spear of the age in your side
Lost in the rages of fragrance
Lost in the rags of remorse
Lost in the waves of a sickness
That loosens the high silver nerves
(2)literal translation of denouement is untying
  Aug 2024 Nat Lipstadt
guy scutellaro
we know each other better than we know ourselves...
  Aug 2024 Nat Lipstadt
lmnsinner
the speedometer that measures the
acceleration and deceleration of
time in our lives journey is
remarkably similar to the one
we employ in our vehicles

intra moment we can move from
slowness to rapidity in minuscule
amounts of seconds, all the while,
those few bursts of being high, are
parcel of a longer cross country trip
that could be calculated in years,
decades, even life-spans

though we lack the visual imprimatur
upon our eyes of our exact speed most
times, we always have in our possess
a notional beginning and ending

we take a trip to grocery store, up/down
to NYC, fly to Paris just because, and return
home to bury and burn loved ones,
witnesses and fellow travelers to the
longer segments of our irregularly
configured continuum

here, you sigh, why, do you trouble us
with this obvious observation when
we have so much to do, so many roles
to don, and the kids need milk for cereal,
which is a thirty minute round trip that
should have not been necessary had
we “organized our moments of movement
far better organized!

perspicacity.

this word has been mindful for me for a
days, while bits and bobs, of a poem’s
composition blurted up and out, in  
some disarray, while the mind, tries
to collect them all, all for one, for
later collation and an unknown
destination

the wisdom to see down the road.
to plan accordingly, when we can oft
not* see around the next corner,
or even the next single steps we “plan”
to take, made without any thought
thereof

is there a poem in here, somewhere, Oh Sinner-man?
perhaps…or, just an indifferent end?
Nat Lipstadt Aug 2024
the waters of the Sound, churning,
make my hands a five-in-hand knotted,
full of writhing wriggling writing poem
lines with an go<hesitant~go  slow, knowing that,inspiration is daring me, just as the  whitecaps are, troubled trolling so nearby,
gone can hear them mocking me with their
17knot  ‘breeze,’ your lyrics are but
blowing in the wind, soon enough will
shift to someone else, leavening your
deflation with a non~riser sour-dough mix
of unfinished sadness

in advance, knowings that every poem
more like a Monarch butterfly, here but
for a momentary traversal travesty,
gone faster than the eye blink, and this
infilling fleeing fleet urgency more
likely to die on the pyre of unfinished
rejected draftees, unselected for service

nonetheless ~ “follow” lyrics refuse me
to let~leave a poor tribute to vine~die, the
fingers speak in unison, urging me on,
not wanting to escape from this fantasizing
moment, urging me to tap tap tap
evermore!

“ Come taste and smell the waters of our time,”
Richie invites us all to find our own water,
let it work its magic upon our
nerve endings, but,
mine full of sendings, how?

can one sit seated in the Poet’s Nook,
same vista, no visa required ~
just to see it each time
differently, only the truly creative can love it
so much, that they tip into unexplored unexploited
veins of fresh blood and words
and eyes that discern and earn the ability
to write of the old with new inside insights

those! they are the ones you need to follow!
creators! with a small C, see them feel, see them divine with rod, their original water,
from which they emerged, and drink once more, for the water follows them like nutrients, raw materials that nourishes
and they in turn, return to their watery
birth site, their emotional placentae,
drawing from, returning to it new creations

for all of us to follow, fire our senses,
make us!
make art in all our hearts,
and don’t mind me, just

”close your eyes, child, and look at what I'll show you;
Let your mind go reeling out and let the breezes blow you,
And maybe when we meet then suddenly I will know you.
If all the things you see ain't
Quite what they seem,
Then don't mind me 'cos I ain't nothin' but a dream .
‘cos


We
ain’t nothing but a dream,
our disguised muses visiting,
pleading to be
usefully used…
A recurring line from “Follow” lyrics by Richard Merrick, sung most famously by Richie Havens, who made it his marquee signature song, and a standard, immediately ’ recognizable by anyone who listened to music in the Sixities (20th century)

<>
Let the river rock you like a cradle
Climb to the treetops, child, if you're able
Let your hands tie a knot across the table.
Come and touch the things you cannot feel.
And close your fingertips and fly where I can't hold you
Let the sun-rain fall and let the dewy clouds enfold you
And maybe you can sing to me the words I just told you,
If all the things you feel ain't what they seem.
And don't mind me 'cos I ain't nothin' but a dream.
The mocking bird sings each different song
Each song has wings - they won't stay long.
Do those who hear think he's doing wrong?
While the church bell tolls its one-note song
And the school bell is tinkling to the throng.
Come here where your ears cannot hear.
And close your eyes, child, and listen to what I'll tell you
Follow in the darkest night the sounds that may impel you
And the song that I am singing may disturb or serve to quell you
If all the sounds you hear ain't what they seem,
Then don't mind me 'cos I ain't nothin' but a dream
The rising smell of fresh-cut grass
Smothered cities choke and yell with fuming gas
I hold some grapes up to the sun
And their flavour breaks upon my tongue.
With eager tongues we taste our strife
And fill our lungs with seas of life.
Come taste and smell the waters of our time.
And close your lips, child, so softly I might kiss you,
Let your flower perfume out and let the winds caress you.
As I walk on through the garden, I am hoping I don't miss you
If all the things you taste ain't what they seem,
Then don't mind me 'cos I ain't nothin' but a dream .
The sun and moon both arise
And we'll see them soon through days and nights
But now silver leaves are mirrors, bring delights.
And the colours of your eyes are fiery bright,
While darkness blinds the skies with all its light.
Come see where your eyes cannot see.
And close your eyes, child, and look at what I'll show you;
Let your mind go reeling out and let the breezes blow you,
And maybe when we meet then suddenly I will know you.
If all the things you see ain't
Quite what they seem,
Then don't mind me 'cos I ain't nothin' but a dream .
And you can follow; And you can follow; follow...
Source: Musixmatch
Nat Lipstadt Aug 2024
have a credit in your account at the
First NATional City Bank.

Some free advice:

Spend it unwisely, with reckless abandon!
If you do, the credit balance will irregularly and improbably be increased in recognition of
additions to the sadly diminishing stock of
beauty, kindness, and the essences of humanity or some other derivative
thereof,
but  by

Writing more poetry,
one of my first jobs after school was with a large , mega-corp.,
now know as Citicorp,
and prior to that as Citibank,
with thousands upon thousands employees,
and before that as
First National City Bank

imagine my surprise when a letter addressed to
First NATional Bsnk addressed that way to my
(actual, physicals inbox & yup they existed);
Someone in our huge mailroom
decided that it was meant for me!

I was rechristened with the
nicknamed
“City Nat”
(which is how I answered when picking up the phone in our
bond trading room:

Years later at Goldman Sachs,
with 20,000 employees (back then)
called the general operator,
asked for Nat?
and without hesi,
was transferred
to me

now  I ain’t saying if you had asked for Natty or
Lippy,
but we’ll never ever know..
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