Just lately, 'learned,' (what a double entendre that is!), a long time resident and story teller in the empire of creatives who coexist with each other in two dimensions, in deep isolation and simultaneously
in a camaraderie of bonded bones of mutuality, of deep, affectionate
camaraderie admiration for another human, who struggles and desires to please the world by putting worthy words before us to
be felt, not just read in our bosoms, but-placed deeper still, in our very souls.
As is my custom, I oft forget what was written by me, and awoke feeling guilty that I never gave him "His" own poem. So I looked him up on the HP site, and lo and behold!
this tribute came up first...but cease not here, seize this man's living testimonies to the beauty of life and family.
I wrote this, upon refection, for us, a year ago...
Nat Lipstadt Aug 2024
For Spygrandson: A Man
Who Looks in the Mirror, & Sees a Potholder of Simple Design…
~ for spygrandson ~
with deep affection
https://hellopoetry.com/spysgrandson/
<>
I am en~titled
by him,
commissioned by his exacting wording
of this poem’s titular naming,
all my previous attempts are failures,
over designed, too artistic
for his modest self~reckoning &
bearded demeanor,
they demanded
denial with
request for
simplicity of an unflowery
reckoning,
a clean shave,
so to speak…
a potholder of simple design,
a modest picture self-drawn,
but his stories are
sorties tall,
he draws you in, worthy draftsman sketches
of words, tales short, poems complete,
tales so sweet, of characters uniquely complete,
and you think,
they cannot be fictional?
and you know they’re no such thing,
ok, maybe,
some taller and a few perhaps dreamed,
the big characters of those
giants of simple men,
whose deeds were not mythical,
ok, almost mythical…
but truth of the humans of the hammered and nailed tough skin,
who built homesteads in the
plain, in mountains, by rivers that snaked,
unmapped,
except on their hearts and feet
the humans,
that made up
the raw & naked bond holders of
these United States:
bonded by character to the soil and
its curvaceous dancing topography
from
& of the center of our country,
but with eyes keen enough
to stretch from
coast to coast,
to see to shining seas
yes, true,
the grandson be he
to/of an almost mythical man,
and so took thus
his penned name,
the grandfather, a real person
of whom stories are yet told,
for no one can be sure
that & of what deeds
this spy did,
on hostile, unfamiliar,
continents,
but the photographic proofs,
I have seen…
His blood thickened by many infusions,
a cross cultural experiment,
happily not unique,
just **** rare
but enough of this;
read him,
let his
tongue take you to
the unfamiliar,
a literary Ansel Adams,
who never saw the plain(s) men & women,
unworthy of being forgotten but
forever being
celebrated
ask him for a potpourri of his short stories
of war, the bonds that men forge in combat,
tween the dead that still live on and
the living,
who have unreadable dead spots within,
they carry their dying glances,
their dying wishes,
and who are honored by him
in his continuing recollections
with walking stick in hand,
even if going outside
to “just” measure the snowy depths,
he leave markers and trailers,
for us to recall how to weep,
from love and pain,
from following generations of his
beautiful blonde
children who are poster models for
the traditional all american imagery,
but thriving within,
with his
wanderlust, his mixed fiery visions,
and acting, singing out dramas
befitting their inherited
visions…
<>
here
I cease,
here
I weep,
at the impoverished words
scrivened in haste,
through tears of pleasure
intended to give honor
to this man,
who cedes me the pleasure of his existence,
and enhances my world
when he asks me,
unwittingly commissions!
a poem,
about
the human character,
who see himself unusually!
“as a potholder with a simple design”
and as usual,
I fail miserable…
maybe,
nick the outer edge of a bullseye target,
because the important words that he deserves,
I have not yet mentioned:
honor, loving kindness and friend.
perhaps he is correct,
but doesn’t grasp
that without simple men like him
to hold the *** upright and firm,
we all would be lesser or
even lost.
maybe,
now I am one
with
done