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  Jun 2024 Poetoftheway
Nat Lipstadt
“Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more”
(Henry V, by WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE)

Morning into Mourning

<>

I speak it softly, for though battlefield is steeped in quietude
of the lively greenery, endless lawns of healing fields
surrounded by multitudinous shades of blue waters,
my eyes piercing , joining in
as sunrising separates the veil
dividing light from dark, new from prior,
a went-before and a
soon-to-be
and a familiar-what-to-be-hereafter,
but a skyed breech it is,
with sun ray stairs inviting my
upright ascension into this newness

Welcoming the exposure of my trembling, though it is not fear that causes my shaking, but the colored warmth barely warming, yet,
stoking, stroking the drape of chill
away, away! from my night-sealed pores

the majestic surfacing of the waters peinture impasto, with its roughened but genteel thick, dabs, dots, swirls, swishes belie the overall atmosphere of calm it conveys, and Shakespeare’s rallying cry of men rises to the mind forefront, for the bay is my battlefield,
the day’s new light the breeching of the sky’s
envelopment of our world, summons to rise and
step forward intimately into the tableau of morning

into the breech, into the unknown,
to lift one more poem from breast,
shed tears of welcome, and death fears banished,
a battle to the unknown from the foretold past,
and, but


you shout
no!
<>
tis a day like all others,
of rectitude sans gratitude
another quantity of known drudgery, another,
“Woke up, fell out of bed
Dragged a comb across my head
Found my way downstairs and drank a cup”

The breach is within me,
a splitting of the head,
laid flat out upon my desk,
writing down scrupulously
officiously,
the same figures inconsequentially,
letters deranged, daily merely rearranged,
prison vista,steel and glass appearing with
the same exactitude of every day ever prior,
the sun invisible, the unceasingly unchanging
dark deep of the shadowy of manmade canyons…

speak to us no more of views, vistas,
but the fistulae, the empty places
where interconnected dots and dash’s,
light and ombre blends of dark ochre  
gradations of bland de~gray~ding
are our time’s patchworks of familiarity,
cursed with annualized daily reciprocity,
a *** for a tat,
a woolen watch cap,
a  black Balaclava,
drawn over our heads
lest the drudgery be too readily apparent!


<>
mere mortal am I,
mortal wounded by our disparate
and desperate differing points
of view,
and we split ourselves in two,
hoping for a way forward of
reconciliations,
successful hostage negotiations,
pushing these contradictions,
back inside my heads,
until confronted
once again,
and find new words coming,
to bind me of the divisions between
or even,
to blind
me to the gaps between
my left and right
brain.

for I am both men,
one and the same,
forever
battling


until the morrow, then…
morning into mourning
June 14 2024
tween 3:30 AM ~ 10::00 AM
fitful sleep, fistfuls of vision's pieces
  Jun 2024 Poetoftheway
Nat Lipstadt
the propulsion of compulsion is indefatigable,
it cannot no more, be ignored, as if it is forming
a holy commandment, number 11, you must
write when so ordered, denial is temporary
i n s a n i t y, and the backlog of nuances be
comes longer and longer by the instant

the provocateurs, them eyes, those eyes,
even the ears and tongue join in to instigate,
the cabal of influencers who peddle no product,
demand no payment but total obeisance and
sometimes low-class instant fufillment, for here
I am in servitude,@ 4:33am, by dawn’s early light
(no **** for real), propelled and compelled by
the creative, the spilling urgency of the need
to expel notions of potions that flit between the

frontal lobe, parietal lobe, cingulate gyrus,
and prefrontal cortex: (I told  you, it’s a cabal!)
all  firing
up neurons like electron spark plugs, and only
I can see the sparks colliding inside as letters,
words, phrases, none lazy, all demand long life,

or the Perpetuity of the Momentary”

it grows lighter by the minute and the sporadic
lights across the bay wink morse code secrets
to the observant, and Noyac’s  tree line has
become a distinguishable and distinctive
land mass to which I crossed last nite via &
upon the South Ferry, when all these conflicting
concepts began a painful birthing delivery,
the coagulation of the flighty, merging and
transforming into my child, in my bed, through
the picture window that has so oft been complicit
in the ganging up on my very, very old and restless
brain

but, uh, this ecrivez, this motion that the momentum
of the momentary desiring & deserving of monuments
to the perpetual
won’t be stilled and hours later, with it’s invisible hands
around my throat, it yanks from within what did not
exist ten minutes prior, but always existed inside me
as a jumbled puzzle, gestating quietly till a swift kick
of birthing pains insufferable accompanied by her
raucous dreams, awoke me from ******* and rhyming
Rem Sleep, to now, this moment, named forever as
4:57am and this noisy newborn, covered in embryonic
fluid (wonderful but disgusting really) is all ready pealing and peeling
off suggestions for brothers and sisters, this arrogance
is untenable, but the babe laughs at me, for it knows that
there are hidden, voluminous files of titles awaiting their
turning time of final conception

no longer nighttime, an early forming day, it too,
covered in its own fluidity, awaits discovery, for
the lights from across the bay have gone to bed,
turned off but the greatest, more powerful
brighter discharges
of the Sun Gods

The Bay’s waters are still, though my woman is not,
muttering, still dreaming out loud, as if she wishes
to foment
turbulence, and desires a boat for safe conveyance
across the dark seas of the night to the searing bright
June summer day that the Greek seers have forecast,
and then that moment, like it’s older sibling, will demand,
it’s very moment of personalized perpetuity, its own
unique naming,
a full recording, a welcoming by the Preservation Band,
amidst the glory of its mother mornings colorings of
palest blues, puffery of cumulus whitiwhispers all tinged
in my favorite, flavored color, creamsicle orange,
and the calming power is self evident for the rustling
back and forth of raucous dreams have ceased, and I too
am no longer possessed by the moment, until soon
when the hands creep slow round my throat by a new
moment, and all is lost, all is gained and a newest poem
is brought from the womb of my ancient past, my currency
of the next minutes and the wealth of words that are
available to us all! demands one of us, perhaps you?
to commit its actualized existence into reality

I bid you a soft adieu, for the chores of existence
those demanding pests of drudged biblical
pestilence
can no longer be kept
waiting

nml
5:21am
Sun Jul 16
2024

writ at you know where…
writ in the “moment”
Poetoftheway May 2024
~for R.A.~

“ I don't think I could write a poem if my life depended on it”

pardon me, Madame,
past is prologue,
waiting is just delay,
a prolonging,
a satisfaction delayed,

so
take the dog for a walk,
observing his rambunctious
wanderings,
compare and contrast
your and our own
owned
wanderings
perhaps,
the parallels
will see a vision,
even a parable?

you’ll be feeling that
tugging pull,
a leashed excuse pulling
you own hands and head
to have a quiet meeting,
in front of a blank,
blue line ruled
clean sheet

just cause that
nagging, won’t ,
non stop
heart beating
rhythmically
is questioning,
then a funky
annoying
voice
assumes control
and your hand moves,
with no control,
and when all is said,
it is done.
The classroom window had a clear view of the park
and when the July clouds painted the sky dark
the boy would start to cry!

Why, the teacher exclaimed, why these tears
it's all so pleasant, and there's nothing to fear
the rain is so welcome, it does only good
so why boy it finds you in such bitter mood!

Saying thus, he would walk back to his table
by the rain upon windowpane, I was inconsolable
brisker than rain were the tears in my eyes
in the thought there would be flood, water would rise
the walk back home would be a herculean feat
with the street flooded, hidden manholes beneath
I was haunted by the spectre of how the water rose
crawled past my chest, and reached up the nose
the swelling river would find me an easy victim
the teacher didn't know, I didn't know how to swim!

When the school bell finally rang, they ran joyous in the rain
splashing and soaking merrily, their way was heaven
only I stayed back, as if my feet had grown roots
late evening I reached home, in heavy sodden boots.
  May 2024 Poetoftheway
Left Foot Poet
somewhere nearby is a closet that only ever expands,
and all sacrificial offerings of homage, therein, accepted,
I know of a t-shirt of a medium gray chesterfield, with
white lettering, in a simple font, waiting, stating that:

FOG HAPPENS

this blunt factual, a summary judgment, does not
do fog full justice, though on the islands where I live,
its directness captures the massive totality of the
power of fog as a gentler reminder by the gods of
weather, that they are in possession of tools varied,
and fog which exert no harm directly, yet is fearsome
paralyzing, and extraordinarily stealthy, sneaky and
some other word that begins with S but propriety forbids
my writing *****.

is akin to an alien invasion, covering, never hovering,
taking all as prisoner, though never a full on
kidnapping, just an unlawful imprisonment -
sure you’re “safe” in the confines of your abode,
which is actually alarming, when you look out
the windows and see nothing, awaiting for your
own disappearance too but your cells knowledge
reassurance says not today boy, but do stay inside!

fog does not burn off. myth. it moves en masse,
in its beyond~bulky
undefined confines,
as a singular one celled amoeba,
moving at its own chosen speed, somewhere else,
to hide comfortably, knowing that its power is truly
awesome.

we watch it depart with relief, though it can come for
extended vacations in your environs, its peripatetic
course is such that it likes to lazy~leave, oft dropping
off pieces that are gentle called medium cloud cover,
as a reminder/warning/mission statement of
anytime, anywhere, anyway and nothing can
impede, inhibit, interfere, interrupt, with its own
rules of engagement, and is always victorious!


I will cease here, for there much more yet
to say about fog, as I’m watching its slow
withdrawal to caves in the sky, comfortable
air conditioned and above interfering rain clouds,
and the sun rays cannot harm its delicate,
deadly elemental,
shades of pale soft skin.

But it will be back, and so will I, to chronicle its
misadventures, describing better its blunderbuss
personality, hidden complexities, but for now know
in its abbreviated simplicity, eloquent encapture,
and all encapsulating nature, ‘tis no accident that
there are many things in your life beyond your control,
but this phenomenon unique for there is no
countervailing, counterwailing,
only a
just does,
but with no justification
only obsfucation,
when we state:

FOG HAPPENS!
Tue May 21 2024
  May 2024 Poetoftheway
Marshal Gebbie
We waft and wend our way through life
Avoiding complication's strife,
We meld our courtship to the mould
Incorporating righteous hold,
All the while, ***** our head
Until such time that we are dead.

Some abide by rules, absurd
Others running with the herd,
A few deny the Devil's work
Others conjure the berserk
Wherewithal we come and go
As tactically, as best we know.

Some we win, some we lose
We play the cards, as best we choose,
For life is but a gambled toss
Of joyful win or saddened loss
With courage then, we all stride out
In optimism's bouyant shout.

When, at last, the curtains fall
Aloft, we hold, summation's call,
Good or bad, that last decree,
Bears determination's fee.
For judgment's tidal vanity
Is but a ripple, to humanity.

M@Foxglove.Taranaki.NZ
19 May 2024
A final shout to the Gods!
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