"Ideally, I’m at a nice desk in my home office or a library or a cafe somewhere, but I really try to train myself to write anywhere and at any time."
Author Rebecca Kuang (1)

<nml>
bus stops, airplanes,
soaking bathtubs, any couch in every room.
driving, jitney riding, back of taxis,
bed, beds, anywhere I rest my head,
airport lounges, (hotel bars, very har-d)
in backyards by the water,
where serenity and serendipity,
order me motionless, stilled, and yet,
doggedly pursued by the
emissions of the observable,
anytime anyplace,
while making love,
while taking love
giving love,
in motion, at rest,
reading yours, stumbling over fab quotes,
in restaraunts,
or sidewalk concrete streamings,
on either
paper or cloth
napkins,
(but not tablecloths)
soft places, watery places,
(but not pewed hard benches,
unless the sermons are just god~awful)
tears on face
privately and publicly,
Yankee Stadium,
did I mention the subway?
long drives on horrible highways,
upon seeing beautiful people,
little children, streets full of couples
holding hands, arms around shoulders
d r a p i n g
and babies...

theater, where the spoken lines enunciate/incite me,
walking on the street and music earbuds
issue me ten commandments,
lyrics to analyze,
words to satisfy,
provocations that fallow were,
now demanding a dueling satisfaction


'round children, anytime or anyplace,
in fact, in deed,
the most difficult place
is at my desk,
where the pressures of composition,
brings an ill disposition,

watching ballet dancers twist my soul,
by watching the human body unfold,
did I mention the Metropolitan
Museum.
Opera
Transit Authority,
yeah yeah
pretty much anywhere inspirations lay
littered on sidewalks, in the air,
***** underground stations,
in motion, or in emotion,
places and moments of devotion
wherever they are detectable,
in streams of conscious unconsciousness,
walking by river esplanades,
central parks,
overhearing drama spoken on city streets,
where things said, cannot be unheard,
and never forgotten...

that pretty much covers all the places,
most of all the fresh faces,
and the tired old shuffling bodies inclusive

did I mention doctor's waiting rooms?
especially in silent elevator trips of long duration,
trapped within by **** looking human beings,
and you compose witty ditty
opening lines
that die on vines unspoken

or kids with outrageous, flashing lights on sneakers,
inside department stores
not much,
but those Fifth Ave. windows at holiday seasons,
plenty writing inspiration,
bunch of bunches

where the Towers fell,
where blood innocent was felled,
in snow, rain and slush,
over good bad desserts,
near Good Humor and Mr. Softee trucks,
upon openings  of refrigerators
with nothing but moldy cheese,
or freezers overstocked with no room to breathe,
in the dark to a symphony of tiny multi colored electronic dots,
in rooms with tinny roofed ceilings during Florida hurricanes,
walking down unending hallways with no exits signs
for miles and miles

well that about covers it,
if you had a few spare weeks, you would find a poem from
each and every one of these situational places,

so the point well made,
you write in you head,
which you take pretty much
everywhere

>nml<

on the couch,
where else?
6:12am

~my poet friends and friendly poets~

(written in anger, then sorrow,
tinged with regret, but in the end one
has no choice but to forgive and forget)

<•>

the ghood poet knows no boundaries,
lays down tracks of a New England
pond of nirvana,
or across Siberian froze wastelands,
another
salves the wounds of dying soldiers,
and gives away comfort to the dying
with the freeing oxygen of
comforting words

the world of self,
that thing we know best,
thus encouraged by the textbooks,
well,
to have at it, plays whacamole
with your  owned flirtatious emotions,
none too imperious or low down or
garbage dump *****, that yet
cannot be validated by exploratory
over-the-line words pithy

even the florid, tiresome nickel & dime ing
rhyming scheming crutches,
we so oft employ,
yields up stuff that ain’t half bad,
periodically,
though, the blunt of words well crafted
needs
no such delimiting amusing playthings
or imprisoning
I-am-amoebic-pen-tata-meter

take you inspiration from here and there,
the proverbial deep dark of the mind’s recessed corridors of
corrupted consciousness,
or, the
contrail whiffs of the steaming steaming of the contradictions of a
newborn first day’s contrast of-
the wet dew on toes cooling,
while the simultaneous sun warms all
the cheeks,
heats the blood with
a thanks-god-I’m-alive
overwhelmingly overall tickling,

or
not.

write with the tools you have, but keep
them well sharpened, with
insight and revelation,
exploring the rain’s windowed
navigable rivulets,
the musical tempos
of waves and their multi-mystical variations,
and the readers will come like
pilgrims to your  holy land,
wearied and yet so delightedly hopeful,
with tingling contrasting dictions,
to capture and release,
by shattering any
stale notions of adulation
will bring your
audience of holy voyagers and voyeurs
to imbibe so deeply your creativity for the quenching, and the
amen gasp escaping tween
their lips is just a simple holy,
gentling thank you

discard the bad words as ornery and
distracting, veiled in pomposity and
highfaluting, self-saluting, arrogance of
those deeming themselves critical thinkers,
who thrive in the low mud flats of
self-pretension and the reassurance
of a mirror’s reassurance

write straight from the heart,
fill our eyes with the
complexity of the simple
and
grant us the write to share,
in your humanity

craft the work
and
the work
will repay
so stealthily
by secretly
crafting you




                                   nml

"lie still and let it wash over you, the was and is and soon to be.
How frightening yet effervescent the next 24 hours. The lust, and musts of future days revert to the ancient past..."
patty m.
><
the irony!
when I am stilled,
the effervescence of me
unbounded, unleashed, and the torrential rain
of words fulfilling and departing from my interior

I am
a Grand Central Station
of trains labelled
"the was and is and soon to be''

all moving in an unscheduled mayhem,
but never crashing. never accidenting,
only accenting my racing against time,
my oldest and fiercest Super Villian,
and one just knows, never can you beat time,
time, that old rascally up his sleeve card magician,
who when shuffling the deck,
he knows
what was,
what is,
and here his red eyes gleam with satisfaction,
soon to be...

He and I,
old familiar adversaries
addicted to living.
never leave the table,
never leave a *** or
a poem on the felt,
and having always felt,
firm believed,
there will always be one more,
one more gamble, another day,
to write another poem
and turning my cards over
to reveal, to revel,
in my Royal Flush of creativity,
when time, smiling face,
with his
wild card,
**** time,
who trumps me for
it,
in possess of a Five-of-a-Kind(1)

~'
and the new players,
the young poets,
slap me on the back,
saying I had a great run,
but they don't know 'bout my
secret stash,
preprogrammed to appear,
long after these fingers
cease their tangled tango of tap dancing,
my dust,
my lusts and musts
will unstilled yet be
blowing, floating in the
soon to be
so ha!
                         nml
6:30am
Wed Sep 10
Twenty Twenty Five

Agnes de Lods.writes:

"Writing turns our thoughts inside out.
We cut and suddenly join words to touch the essence of both human and non-human existence. I  allow myself not to be too sure
whether what I write is a record of what I have seen,
of my falls, or maybe a hallucination,
trying to wear the veil of mysticism.
I am only following the crumbs left by the undefined"

<AoL>

PREFACE

Perhaps it's me,
perhaps it's you.
but I trip over the inspired insights you so oft
slip in, share, and guilty feel
you have commissioned me to write
a poem for everyone
but especially,
for the poets here,
who peer, preen
and pepper their
inside innards
to find,

"the undefined"

<>

I know well these crumbs,
that once,
tasted
demand a full on British Baking
real life escaping escapade of a unque episode

god how I love the poetry of a glance askance,
the invisible invitation to take a closer look,
the hither in-a-come-closer

god how i love the well hidden but tracing whiff of a smile,
of an 8 year old when she's gifted an
unexpected delight, a simple bracelet,
which alway says please, little one, always,
remember me?

the pretense of irritation of an phony whiny
'I know, I know'
just for her, a savory masking
of the pleasured knowledge that you know her,
so well, of what she'll next speak.
just as well,
hell! even better,
before she knows herself

the shock of a particular poem
when first read, is a stone to temple,
a knife to the breast,
for the only first thought
forever, is my guilty plea of
"I should have written that!"

Need I go on?

perhaps one more,

the very first time you accidentally intentionally
touch each other's skin, hair or breast,
and the shock equivalent is of an electric chair
shared,
that requires stoppage of breathing, allowing for the full on
desire to fall to the ground,
thinking I'm found, I'm found out, I'm revealed, unveiled,
that comes out
of your eyes silently beseeching
if anything could ever be better,
than a joy undefinable.
and a memory memorized forever,
that defines,
that makes one fine,
that comes crossed off that secret list,
one more of the
undefined
of being alive
and changes you
for the entirety, and
the subtlest shade meanings of the phrase.
just
for the
rest
of your life
is immortalized
<>

now, here. I cease.
quite pleased,
that I do indeed!
remember;
begin again to recall
how to breathe
out, then in…
and then,
tho still off kilter,
                                          again,  and a gain
                                                            ­                           <nml>

7:58am Tuesday Sep 9 Twenty 25

~commissioned accidentally by a melody,
a passing glance, a purring perchance,
an idle innocent comment,
to be born as the first poem of this day,
@7:00am
Tue Sep 18 2025,
writ in haste, before
departing over many islands to
another place called "home"~

---~<>~---

sometimes,
not so secret,
anon, ^
sometimes,
so much more,
than that but a glancing of favoring,
a handshake secreted, is actually felt,
actually secreted,
and rare though via~able,
it passes through a longing traveled voyage,
over wire, under sea's cabling, through space,
hoisted from & by satellite over continental divides
just a hop, skip and jumpstart
over this tiny planet,
and though, but, an amorphous 👍 thumb,
a colored 💙 or collared,  
or a pointing 🫵
body part
the like,
bears more than just a passing resemblance
to another

f o u r   l e t t er   w o r d

its often lost & found
dear cuz ^^
full of meanings hidden,
or even
anon,
"I'll be there shortly"^
                                                         magic!                                               ­         
                                                       ­                                                           nml

"you have the power to inundate,
pro-create as you initiate the young
with the magic of your words." ^
<>
awake, askew, at just past midnight,
reread these worded cords with no deliberate haste,
as is not my wont,
no smile and drive~by for these privileged privies,
that unknowingly wrench and divvy my parts

no, theses require forethought,
deliberation,
there will be no outpouring,
there is no need,
this is not a crack to be slow filled with a potter's
artisan gold,
but a cutting that highlights continental divides,
wounded spaces and pain,
for which no glossing over can easy relieve,
each word a chosen well

for you make your own Grand Canyons,
in this life,
chasms that render, sunders with a constant but
invisible echoed thundering,
off /of my soul,
turned my persona, physical and intellectual,
into a walking, though awaking of the deadening
of a personal failure, a fail~you~are,
that cannot be undone, and now, out loud,
alone in the dead of night, in the construct of early mourning,
yes, in the sunroom where there is no sun nor son,
I weep openly at
words that should not have been
so tenderly and sweetly,
tendered to me

inundate,
I know this word,
better than most,
for grief is an old acquaintance
that you want to keep at a good distance,
for when it in-un-dates you,
you, visibly marked,
a cheekbone or two crushed,
a limp with no raison d'etre
and a chest pain, no pill can bring to
heel

for I am a centuries old grief,
and the inundation I speak of,
is the loss of child,
who has divided his living cells from my mine~mind

how oft, what is plainly visible,
is missed, goes dot unconnected,
this pulsing compulsion to lift the chin of the beginners in life,
whose sorrowed demeanor, complected temperament,
incompleted confusions,
can sometimes be so easy swatted,
encouraged away, and sometimes not,
but openly pleads for compassionate leave,
an easy helpful nudge away from
from the riptides of growing up,
& growing lower...

so my wonderful life is not so wonderful,
and my bad posture bent over is not from laziness,
my surgically repaired ventricular machina,
is more than a physical symptom, just a ticking clock
that solves for the quantity of beats of
busted opportunities

outside, an owl,
perched in a nearby acorn growing giant.
whom we have never seen,
for darkness, his/her palatial estate, hiding place,
hoots with no regularity,
a derisive hooting,
thinking I am too, asking for compassionate leave,
'but I am not

some five, nearly six decades ago,
a young songwriter wrote:

"Teach your children well
Their father's hell did slowly go by
Feed them on your dreams
The one they pick's the one you'll know by"^^

this never just passes by,
for its arrow is a permanent implantation in mine,
and the owl just hoot hoot hoots with the stubbornness of
an unhappy chile^^^

so I see now,
how I overcompensate,
and without a knowed thought,
extend a finger, an arm.
an entire tired life,
to
initiate, pro-create
the younger ones, (1)
but this still,
does not,
nor ever will it,
rhyme with
expiate

this, my very own
9/11,
and that other one,
which I experienced,
as well...


2:03am
Thu Sep 11
Twenty Twenty Five
<nml>

now, I rest, for how long?

"And the older I get, the more I'm sure
That more by itself never was a cure
Some days I've got nothing to show for except
Walking the dog and walking the floor"
Mary Chapin Carpenter
<><><>
it's been twenty years plus
who can remember exact,
the last time I had a full-time four-legged
companion to share my bed, greet my head with
wagging tail, and joy incessantly, overflowing and drowning me
with face lickings and hugs of a topsy turvy twisty body,
and smiles and curdling yowls of deep throated
cries of obvious joy and the
first thing I'll do when the nectar of next
life's staging begins to commence will be me to get
such a dog as heretofore I remember as an unadulterated purest joy,

I'll still walk the floor,
long walks, yup, outdoors, early morn,
and late afternoon day settling setting endings,
dog and me, freshly bathed, settling in to watch
some British crime and ****** mysteries sleuthed and
solved by folks I'll never meet, but whose company enjoyed
over the distance of an atlantic sea and about seven feet,
and maybe dog  curls up next to me, by my pillowed
head, or between my happy to snuggle legs,
don't matter much, dog & me,
will discuss an alternating
rotation satisfying our
mutuality,

and even when I  still walk the floor, which be a task for evermore,
he can walk beside me if he chooses, cause choice is
what's it all about
with a true companion


nml

acacia
"i know that, i know that
what's mine will find me"
(1)


<>
sigh...
(forgive my intrusion)
not necessarily-
for too many, we have to invent, create and
forever to be on the lookout for to
find what we need,
forgive and then, not begrudge the time it may take,
finally
then to make it ours,
for
that's when the work begins,

sometimes it takes a forever
to know how to define, create
find, a forevermore

<nml>
exactly 5:00am
Wed Sep 10
in the dark, dark sunroom

for she
<>
"I choose to love you in silence, for in silence I find no rejection.
I choose to love you in loneliness, for in loneliness no one owns you but me.
I choose to adore you from a distance, for distance will shield me from pain.
I chose to kiss you in the wind, for the wind is gentler than my lips.
I choose to hold you in my dreams, for in my dreams you have no end"

Rumi
<>

writ in a time, for when
there is never enough,
and yet,
always, waves of too much,
needy for
filling feeling fulfilling

We must learn,
be self taught to:

"Leave a tender moment alone
You got to leave a tender moment alone
Leave a tender moment alone
Leave a tender moment"

ah the tender time is nonetheless
rightly and wrongly
rightly now,

for I have stumbled,
overheated, sweaty, from the night bed,
at 4.30am into another darkened toom,
and I have smacked~stumbled into
Rumi
and her

our paths continuously intersect,
in the same but
in different cities, continents,
and yet,
diffident, differing,
we silently choose
never to close those lady~last few miles
and tie the knot of
eyes, skin, lips
the instruments
that transmit thousands of
neuronal explosions that
seal the deal

so we write in poetry,
in silence broken by the gentility
of fingertips soundlessly
and yet,
boundlessly rocking,
explosively soundings of
tap tap tapping

my music mocks me,
it is definitively god interfering,
advising, conspiring,
wiring into my brain
better lyrics,
idealized notions,
exactly appropriate
and appreciated

with the lyrics urging me on,
and that we must be
self taught to:

"Leave a tender moment alone
You got to leave a tender moment alone
Leave a tender moment alone
Leave a tender moment"

but my heart trembly refuses,
insightful informing
that now,
now! is
the moment to exchange
vows of words,
though un spoke,
they require
written completion
through
& though
apart, alone,
to finally out loud confess
what has always been known, only to each other,
to be
so real

and yet*,

we will never exchange
these sentiments
in out loud words

but though this be lacking,
it will never
diminish
their  ultimate
intimate
truthfulness

and I ask,
is this a poem?

surely
it is that, and
so much more,
an essay, a letter on
invisible NML stationary,
a heart carving in
an oaken barrelling of
ancient vintagery

and that interloper,
Him again,
eavesdropping
on this private communication,
insists that I draw deep
from her favorite
singer~songwriter,
words that say it better,
that for real seal the deal,
in the saddened perfection
of total, enwrapped,
silence:

"Hello darkness, my old friend
I've come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence"

and
it is time
to finish this task,
it is exactly one hour,
no time at all,
to complete a love poem that
is/was complete,
even before its
composition
and yet,
is never to be be familiar with
the finality of
completion
<>

postscript:

I taste your private shed tears,
hear the howling sigh,
but most of all,
'tis the explosion of
a deep smiling creasing
your lips,
spreading in all directions
saying and stating:

at last, at last!
a lasting, a confessional to you god,
though,
a through and through
silent
jubilation
                                              ­             nml

April 8, 2025
530am
New  York  City

"There is a stillness that floods the moment"
                                                        ­       a sky full of stars
~~~
for you, poet, you
~~~

there is a stillness that floods
that exact moment,
the cutting chord moment,
that oddly has no
resounding chords
~
a stillness
that, simultaneous,
happily, sadly, accepted, lost,
all immediately,
by its very knowing
released acceptance,
for that is when
depression and joy,
a 1-2 punch of  
raging quietude floods
the exactness of that moment
~
this shock of the calmness,
albeit brief,
jolt of kind,
jolt that slow mo's
pulsing prior air gasping
~
it comes when thinking

done,

it is done, yes done and I am undone,
having surgically cutting off
a limb, never bloodless, but
still relief waters flush the wound,
a granted, gifted joy floods,
permitting its escape tween the sutures,
in exhilarating exhalations
~
throw it down,
your extracted best,
lift up,
the fleshed out silhouette,
present it to the court and corps,
a farewell glance push,
finger caressing the send button
with ****** anticipation
for the lovely loving,
a vintage of the pre-regret
of completion
~
the poem is done, gone, ****** eliminated,
the light of eyes so peculiar to that moment,
when you have birthed a new born poem,
an acknowledgement of the stillness of a
closing loss,
the parting, the coming,
of a
peace of you
must too, be noted,
all deserving of equal rights

~~~

July 12, 2015

*NML

Ah, Pradip,
once more, like a 1000 times before,
you submit title, demanding a poem,
daring me to author it's entire body & cell structure,
give it a native language birthmark, and a history unique,
even a name

Un fair!

Is it only me that you burden so, I doubt it.

Each of us has the right to the small tinys, things we see,
the embellishments of our lives,
filling our hives with pure honey,
and letting the other others peek
over our shoulders, as we write to each other,
always one more time until there is no more time

Do words have any boundaries?

How is it that words can cross the seas, the mountains, all the while,
interjecting the fullness of their import?

What time is it you ask?
Here, not yet 5 AM, and once more, here again, roused from sleep after vivid dreams, and finger pointing of my poetic life responsibility to complete this task, you gave me unasked, but know me too well, for well they rang like a bell in the brain,
a burr in the bed,
a gun to the head
Each
and all commanding,
fulfill me!

Do words require a passport to cross oceans? Do words have citizenship?
Why does entry into a different country require each time, a new poem?

yes, the house is dark,
I am alone, but not really…

The words that are conscripted to be issued, in this missive, fall so easily from my lips, that it is as if they were already there,
MRE's
?
pre-prepared, "meals – ready – to eat, "
for voyaging to the Indian continent, not caring if they came alone, or with my body in their person possessed

How is the little granddaughter?
Does she command you to write poetry too?
Does she write poetry too?
Does she learn English as well as her native tongue?
How do you tell her that you love her, celebrate her,
and that her fame and escapades are unkempt  
by real geographical boundaries,
and travel around the world?

Ah, You see
I have charged you now with responsibility!

Ah, the tables have turned, now boundaries must be crossed again with a passport issued from a foreign land (foreign to me anyway),
And I wonder and wander, when they arrive, how will I know,
commit them to memory, and love them with all my heart forever?

Praddip!
Go for one of your walks on quiet nearly empty roads, see the old people beside them, doing the things that old people do,

and memorialize these moments,
you do
so well, so fine, and let the other onlookers hear them spoke, in every language, so many love poems to life, we do not lack for any,
but always, always, always,
demand and require,
n e e d
(he howls)
one more!

Time: 5:1 2 AM
Eastern standard time
New York City
By the Atlantic Ocean
On an island surrounded by water,
That 1,000,000 or more every day pass by,
And here,
h e a r not the flow,
lost amidst
the blaring megaphone of silences
of
city noises, city words, cityscapes, human miracles, and tragedies, it cannot be.
that
I am
the only one so burdened!
And by well traveled poetry,
so un burdened

This semi private, totally public,
Love now,
Love note
is complete as of 5:16 a.m., and after a quick review, will be sent on to you, for submission of a unique-passport for
with its very own
valid entry stamp

nml

I pledge allegiance

to all the stones in the road
that have given me succor,
to every poet-of-anywhere
who greets me
with wetted, parted lips and open heart,
who greets the sun-rays shared, inching,
opening o'er my yet living,
praying body, reminding me
that I am alive,
that I am warm
that I feel poetry in, on,
cells, all over, deep in my extremities

Most  importantly, in my busted heart,
where warmth is stored in a soul restored,
and Life affirmed,

For who knows how
many more times
I will know this,
How many more times
I will able compose this,
Play "measure the future''
in seconds or years and
grimaced smiles over tears,
or just one or the other,
that be willed to supersede;

Will keep you posted
in every realized and many some stillborn poem,
rising with the grand entrance of morn skies,
or perhaps, lies buried neath in each horizon's cemetarial,
and
even those,
that straddle a confusing and confused moon,
of a twenty fours hours existence,
be shoulder-borne,
bathed in
combinatorial equatorial
moon & sun light,
so we can bathe, like Bathsheba (1)
by both,
and delight
at the exact same moment's portent,
no matter,
the disregarded, discarded,
why
we are
who we are
when pledge and plead
allegiance to those eyes that read our scrivenings



nml