Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
~For Lila and the others~

there exists
a subset of us,
those who
for whatever reason
do not write,
but “just” repost
other’s work

Above see the word
Just
emboldened
for this selfless task
is justice inherent

For this act of bringing others
to our over constrained attention is an
action of justice,
or more profoundly
doing away with
injustice  of
our human limitations

We could spend days entire
pursuing the works of others,
but life and the extraordinary demands
of writing anew, when the spirit is upon us,
are oft unable to spot, isolate, and
highlight
capture
the best of the rest,
and bless those
who reorient our eyes
away from our own bounded rivulets,
to the tried and truly,  away from
habitual familial familiar good stuff,
but bring us revelations of gems,
caught within the mass maskings of missives that grows hourly, exponentially to
out attention,
to reorient
our attention,
to their filtered selections

Let us say in unison then
a blessing of gratitude
to The Reposters:
*Blessed are You, Adonai our God, Ruler of the Universe, who has granted us life, sustained us, to give thanks to those who enable others, to reach us this season
my questioning,
directed at myself
and the answer simp,
not necessarily simpatico,
cause the answer is either
today, or never,
could be
both or n-either

yeah,
of that age,
when I awake
first two words are
*******, again?

and
if I hurry,
one piecework,
one mo’ poem,
hurried,
may yet be
vented,
scurried,
aired out
or for
quick disposal
sad dispatch

one mo’
disgorged poem
within and withouted,
either side
of midnight

been gorging
on letters ever since
They fed me
sugared letters
& lemons
for breakfast

and the last twenty
sending them you
in a disembodied
softly softly
voice
no matter how
far your imaginary
ears are from me
Sunday AM 9:52 2/19/25
🥲
an existential question so deep,
it can be answered only by
enumerating a million tiny
words:

in the quiet crackling of a spine & unsticking page noise of an opening of a brand new book, a first of firsts, a thrill for free in any bookstore that is yours now, uniquely and forever

in the upward stroking of a smooth
cheek, by your smallest finger, upon
a newborn’s face, your youngest child’s
newborn, and a rare moment of unadulterated love tinged by
immortality

the smile you retrieve when scratching
that old beloved pet’s face, in the exact
spot only you two know and a long time ago
discovered


patrolling the Promenade, espying an
elderly couple so bundled against the
city’s Arctic cold freeze, that movement nearly impossible, nonetheless holding gloved hands in a manner and a moment describable only as inseparable

letting someone jump in front of you,
at the supermarket or the bank, when
they have only one item to purchase, and you, a dozen or so, but the most important item you really really urgent need you have is to prove to yourself that it is possible to buy more time
for a human

crossing with an elegant eldery woman
across the wilds of First Ave., who insists
she needs no help (ha!), but doing it anyway
by complimenting her candy striped cane,
and being rewarded with a “stop that, or
I’ll be forced to take you
home!”

searching endlessly for  red kidney beans in olive oil in a health store that has no less than 19 varieties of everything, and an immigrant teenager employee tskes you across a cityscape of aisles, turns, niches and alcoves  to the exact spot and item, and you
smile and weep because the beam of their smile at your pleasure lights up two souls
simultaneously

next, herbed flavored tofu?

making a bank teller laugh (a near impossibility) when depositing a very large
check, and when asked if there is anything
else you need, informing that you would like to withdraw half immediately but only if they have a sufficient quantity of extra large size single dollar bills!

a group of privileged upper east side college seniors eating out at a wonderful Italian neighborhood restaurant, talking loudly about their recent travels abroad, and how crazy it is that one cannot get a cappuccino in Italy(!) except at breakfast
(oh, the in-justice)

here I stop, because not a lot, of my reasons
to be brought forth are concluded, but only because  you have started
to feel an urgent need to p-
repare/start your own list, immediately if not sooner to ascertain precisely your own anwer to:
Where
are you
being?


5:48am
NYC
Shabbat, January 18, 2025
18 Tevet, 5785
most of these happenings occurred all on one day
last week;; one, 7 years ago…only ine was imagined but is planned

https://hellopoetry.com/poem/4956772/exactly-how-far-is-it-to-you/


https://hellopoetry.com/poem/4956772/exactly-how-far-is-it-to-you/
Nat Lipstadt Jan 10
~Jan. 9, 2025~NYC
<•>
The words of Walt Whitman (1)



~~~~
The origin of all poems!

Oh what a sweeping promise
does Whitman, proffer,
you to entice, to succor.
ease out from within yourself,
that which is therein ready,,
to organize
what be the
fermenting stack of seeded cells of
fomenting
stacked
multiple
simultaneous
observations,
poetry lurking, thine owned senses,
a catalyst cataloging constantly
and you happily despair  to
capture, retain, s u s t a i n,
the pieces of a whole that
knowing only you possess,
that only you can
perfect as the combo
expression of
your
pre~owned assembly
as a solitary protagonist, witness,
and audience!

Understand the origins of the poem,
because it is
original to you,
comprehension of this principle,
means that you will never be
starved for inspiration,
record the ordinary and the peculiar,
the off drink that when mixed,

shaken and stirred
that only you
can pour and better yet ,
s h a r e!
(1) Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself”
“ Stop this day and night with me and you shall possess the origin of all poems,
You shall possess the good of the earth and sun, (there are millions of suns left,)
You shall no longer take things at second or third hand, nor look through the eyes of the dead, nor feed on the spectres in books,
You shall not look through my eyes either, nor take things from me,
You shall listen to all sides and filter them from your self.”
Disclaimer:
an unintended very long poem
from a very long walk,
hoping it might come
to rest within your
heart
but feel free to go your own,
another direction

<•>

“Another writer told me a few weeks ago of his New England Yankee mother,
who believed there are no problems
that aren’t made at least slightly better
by a long walk, and
none that are made worse.“
<•>

a moderate walker am I,
on the Promenade,
hard by the wide & narrow strait,
a tidal estuary, that divides our urban island
from its suburban Longer cousin,

this my path, most oft traversed,
a time spent usually creating,
reciprocating verses from a
copulating mind

every walking expedition is
an-in-transit composition,
an enchantment by a song
anointed, appointed and a
derivation
of a song about
going home

the last of my family
to be buried, l,
to be interred,
finally grounded,
in a park of cedar trees,
next to my immediates,
for can’t think of any other place
that might, would willingly,
not resist mightily, taking me in

it will thy will that they bury me
there if they can get permission
from the heavenly authorities,
but told the betting odds
are 3 to 1
against,
the Lords of song not so happily
with the quantity and the quality
of my unseeded spilled,
of my un-indeeded actions,
they were not entirely
rainbow colored,
some very berry blackened,
urgently misdelivered
with no justifiable delicacy
warranting memorizing or
further discussion

most likely will continue
to remain a pedestrian,
though unlikely I’ll have to
look both waysides before
crossing over

I’ll carry copies of  my scriptures,
psalms and even my one and only
flawless poem in hand,
wrote here so long ago,
s small proof that my theorems
were not
always entirely wrong,
but my replica action figurines,
were posed and struck,
were sufficient evidences
that my overall demeanor
of demeaned marks,
were negative numbered,
irony, they were unlettered
and ungraded,
mostly average, only worthy
of a place in the sadeyed lowlands

So walk I shall,
hoping they give me decent
walking & wailing shoes,
a warm suit,
a fedora or a watch cap,
cause it is more than chilly
down by the uninhabited riversides

this thinning vision is not
tinged with
any tingling regret,
nor sorrow,
what I did, what I wrote,
every word mine alone,
the way I lived,
walking solitaire is
something grown quite accustomed,
and a pretty fair pre~text of a
judgement coming
down

on the morrow,
will walk with no
measurements needed,
not speed, nor distance,
not counting crows or any other
unenumerated birds of a feather,
those on a wire or a river railing
spying observers watching,
who will go unnumbered,
as will all my
steps of no value

so this poem’s title absolute right,
no needs for solving
for absolutions,
was never ever sorry for
taking a walk,
and there are no more vocabulary
modifiers,
unneeded words left, like,

but nonetheless

*only
just don’t know how
this river poem got
so long
Nat Lipstadt Jan 8
12:53am,  January 3,2025
New York City
<>
A Traveler notates these words to my attention, but only because I make myself
a convenient target, for truthfully,
it is addressed to one and all,
to the royalty of:


We,

who speake out loud, to all those who ***** these damp woods full of wet words, that spring up overnight, ripe for the plucking, there for the taking, an exacting where & when they did not even exist
the twenty four prior


These purloined overnight creatures are

white and  black

lettered truffles, like the pages on which we inscribe, the letters raw, exquisitely tasty, shaved, measured in grams, but only when shared with others, in the privacy of our open minds, after being spooned from within us with exquisite care upon the pages that decorate our lives, sprinkled
with great care and cunning


but when consumed, our five senses rage with aromatic pleasured pain, for these letters, so tiny, so powerful, grow only when
combinatory, individual bitty granules,
but when leavened, they enhance, provoke!,
they sauce, the


flavors  of the ordinary

of our experiences,
creating the extraordinary
when interacting upon
our five robust senses


for without the spaces of delineation,
our jumbled words are but the
random jingle jangle of the sounds
of night winds, rustling a tune
pleasant but incomprehensible


Here I take your leave,
with the liberty taken
for speaking in all our names
to a Traveler
who so succinctly captures our work,
the glue of our interactive Us,
Our,

Collective of Individuality
finished @ 1:53am
Nat Lipstadt Jan 1
•~ A tidal strait is a strait connecting two oceans or seas through which a tidal current flows. Tidal currents are usually unidirectional but sometimes are bidirectional. The East River is a saltwater tidal estuary or strait in New York City. The waterway, which is not a river despite its name, connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. (Wikipedia)~•

The river by my dwelling is miscalled by all,
in verity, it is a tidal strait, a battling diversity of fresh and saltwater, with currents visible, bidirectional, clashing eddies underway, are
underwater arguments boiling up to the surface,

!a perfect metaphor for a New Year!
<•>

each year seems like a tumult survived,
the currents of joy and its many alternates,
seem to always clash, spot staining
and yet
the estuary of life flows on and on,
the two seas remain connected,
the salt and the fresh intermingling,
waters
surf~officially calm, stoic,
but appearances misleading

every year different
every year also similar,
substance may vary,
the surprises differing,
but we for-see troubled waters
neath the glassine superficial surficial,
and we hold hands,
knotted fingers until
we raise out arms heavenbound,
asking why,
but expecting no answer
for we
knowingly
live our lives in a
tidal strait
Jan 1, 2025
Nat Lipstadt Dec 2024
flipping channels,
odd conjunction of random itinerants,
mix and mismatched, blend and burr, and the
combination of irritants, annoyingly raucous
pester the barely warmed brain,
by informing me to solve for X,
combine and contrast,
throw all into the blender,
add Fage yogurt, and some chill
ice with interracial combo of
black, blue & red berries
and pour it on you head…

and a breakfast poem is served up…

the utter urgency for civility
rings alarm bells, for it is so threadbare a quality these days, and it is worn by so
very few, and I ponder,
how the quality of
civility
could be so lost,
when I diagram said word,
see it
so clear
April 13 2024
Nat Lipstadt Dec 2024
12/18/24

I choose fingers,
among the array
of many wonderful
parts on offer,

the other sensory emissaries protest,
but the multi-fluency of fingers,
fluent in all Romance languages,
nay, in every dialect, tongue,
tippling the balance in their favor

for the fingers are wonderful conversationlists, trumping the
cooing coyness of sweet wordy
verbs, fingers defy nouns, pronouns

and are fingers the finest conjunction
that was ever conjured ot conjuncted?

the ears hear poorly when upom it
a long  slim finger casually traces outlines
slow~sensually and the eyes shut tightly,
reflexively, the tongue froze to the
mouth roof, muted into inaction

even the the sense of smell lies powerless
should we block the nostrils with but
*******, and breathe mouth mightily

we do not diminish the orchestration’s
totality, the blending of sound ‘n sensation,
but the blind and deaf all must bow before the power of fingers speaking to
every part of the bodies totality
Nat Lipstadt Jan 4
most oft, the
wherever I write,
is duly noted,
it is a due,
due you,
and hopefully,
the why I scribe,
arrives ‘pon your eyes
with Steuben glass,
of diamond tooled curettage,
a clarifying visual of
beauty,

but always
with fair detailed precision
is the
when
denoted,
for it is the timing
of the mining the specificity,
of the exact momentous,
a precious decision
taken by you,
when to turn words
of a few seconds
of a heart’s unburdening,
with
an inescapable reminder,
of the
thereabouts & the whyabouts
the very verity of a serious
causality
that parented the
casualties
we call
our poems

join me then,
in the processional
of denoting the origins,
linkage contained therein
to the work we
c r e a t e

*•for in the recording of the reckoning•
•exactitude of the longitude•
•and l’atitude is the truest revelation•
•of yourself•
the week I was home alone in dec 2024;
well I’m guessing you know the exact time
this one was born😉
Next page