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Nat Lipstadt Nov 2023
an all purpose cleaner response to the

how-ya-doing-question,

as my vibe unmistakable;
the hatred in the world directed at
MY PEOPLE,
is inexplicable, beyond reason,
a hatred raw and pure in the
tiny places we humans hide it, lest
our ancient linkage to an unreasoned,
embarrassing emotion, be revealed

but now revealed it is reveled,
as the freedom to despise is a
valued thing

is an ancient scar, now freshly wounded
and the two thousand year old accumulated, callused,
surrounding wafer thin, layered upon layer of
tissue,
wiped away
in utter disbelief
cleansed,
a different kind of impure clean,
“like” an ethnic cleansing,
traceless, whisked away in a wink of moment,
a goner.

like hope, prior sentient optimism
sentenced to life imprisonment and
this sentence, and this very sentence!
written finally understanding that it is
a punishment
far worse than the quick relief of death.

c’mon, how about a few “fukk you jew”
cri de coeur, heartfelt, genuine, pointless
hate

no, not I, no, not me,
spare me the pithy comments,
the pointless sympathy, glistening
like evaporating water droplets
before disappearing, I ask myself,
not
why they hate, why it persists,
for this I understand and accept
the foulness of what we are capable of is,

beloved,

as a secret pleasure, now secreted in torrents.

no, I ask myself,

why do I write poetry,

for it is as pointless as
the hatred directed at me,
from birth, till death,
and ever after,
the humanity of poetry
just another fraud

another reason
why this man cries in the bathroom,^
not from any shape of shame,

because poetry is pointless
in times of hatred, and now we
know, recognize, it is always
somewhere, nearby, always
present and prescient,
pointless hatred,
itching to be pointed at me,
makes for
pointless poetry.


To whom shall I point my poetry?
Nat Lipstadt Nov 2023
At What Cost?
This Purchase of Our Future

a thousand answers + variegated shadings, a summation:


of millions layers of our owned chosen complexities,
so many possible outcomes, it makes infinite randomness
seemingly simpler than our googolplex crazy preposterous
notational choosings, our owned decisions which though false,
cause nothing is tandomn random except for love at first sight

it’s all  just *******, we conditioned from pre-birth,
the expectations subtly subsumed into the woman’s womb,
overlaid by the ***** donors whisperings that you will be a
great third baseman, or a great bass player, or both, but
“your” fate, ha!
is anything but yours…
to purchase!

if you were born to live in a home with no heat, and water was
obtainable by walking 100 yards away, you would still be a
pianist, writing notes of plaintive need, grand desires, musical
words of agonizing delight just as when
you first blushed when the brain
connected yellow rays with a word,
sunrise,
and an experience was synapticaly imprinted,
that real things could be defined by an ordering of letters and sounds
and you were tongue burnt by a need so great
to collect these pleasurable things and put them in a right order
of your
peculiar
particular
personal
inherited inputted
design

=
and
you yet debate
what is my instrument,
knowing that the multiples of your fingers
are the engine of your existence,
and on any particular day they, your well connected perma-crew,
will pick which is the chosen one,
and
no matter which,
for you had nothing or little purchase,
it was coded in your pre-history
just as you prepare a transmission list
of your own,
when you daily first touch your face,
closing the sensory sensual connection tween
the ephemeral and the physical
and
the new combinations
that you will imprint upon
someone’s flesh,
that is your right,
that is you write,
that is what you were
predestined,
to
create

but,
(what the heck)
you get
to-pick the instrument of the day…


(
that,
is your purchase, your only cost,
everything else has been
pre-paid
)
Thu Nov. 9 2023
8:51am
ny
Nat Lipstadt Nov 2023
zero context shifts

multitasking is multi~asking your brain
to do what does not come naturally,
the enthused poem starts up, lion roaring,
a muscle car, brain throbs organic pulses
semi~******* of a near-completion in
your neuronic *****, exciting and ****
all you-writ so far is:

your name, some crazed, minimal
******* of words with

no context, no preconceived word lotion to
balm-spread over the enflamed areas of
your brain skin
except that it’s
6:47 am, coffee in hand,
your woman slumber rumbles a left over dream,
speechifying, and room, cool conditioned cold,
ignoring notifications of overnight elections,
and a reminder-by-photo where you were this
day seven years ago today, all put asided,
permission ungranted to any distractions,

there will be zero context shifts
til the
spillage of your morn squeaking meager is fully
pillage~d here, it be within my it-takes-no-
village,

@ 6:56 and Whitman is tsk-tsking at the low poetry of my scripting, Hafiz says “hey!
nothing about god or love, what good is that?”

but it’s ok for i’ve emptied the early morning
brain bowels,
defused fusses and asides, tossed asided & there is yet some coffee
remaining but the expiation for having been
reborn this newly birthed day has earned me atonement

for taking up space in this planet
and as of yet, I’ve not stated yet to any, no. all
humans, I hate you ~ but the day is infantile
and opportunity plentiful

@7:03AM
nyc
morning
Wed Nov 8,
in the year of hatred,
a/k/a twenty twenty three.
Nat Lipstadt Nov 2023
Hey Yalie, Diurnal Rituals Yield the Best Poetry

A Yalie jogs before dawn, her senses being exercised,
semi-aware there’s layered poetry out there and it must
be retrieved, for the eyes observe the diurnal arousing of the day,
and this too, must be recorded, part of the ordered duties of living, as the skin cells shed sweat droplets and
words of living, parcels of breathing, a diary of notations,
to educate the brain in ways and things that
professors cannot teach…

every sense operative, interactive, sound off neurotic synapses,
are acrackling, as you lay out the day ahead, calendar and
assignment checks, but the senses don’t care
about that
trivial minutiae of living

nope
the words are now coming fast and you hope your best that
you will retain, retrain the memory to savor save, those
combos of images encapsulated in new word combinations,
that are yours alone, unique, proving to no one but
yourself, that education, science et. al. is a seeded embryo &
you the valedictorian of birth commencement ceremony

so put them trainers on,
and by dawning daylight you are awondering,
now becoming a pondering, and the
question never spoke aloud but oft posed,
is this, this is,
this is why I exist,
and
my identity?

I am an institution in my own right,
in my own write.


Saturday Nov 4
8:01am
nyc
Nat Lipstadt Nov 2023
'In the city of slaughter' ('B'ir Haharegah"), 1904, Excerpt

<~>

Arise and go now to the city of slaughter;
Into its courtyard wind thy way;
There with thine own hand touch, and with the eyes of thine head,
Behold on tree, on stone, on fence, on mural clay,
The spattered blood and dried brains of the dead.
Proceed thence to the ruins, the split walls reach,
Where wider grows the hollow, and greater grows the breach …

The spirits of the martyrs are these souls,
Gathered together, at long last,
Beneath these rafters and in these ignoble holes.
The hatchet found them here, and hither do they come

To seal with a last look, as with their final breath,
The agony of their lives, the terror of their death. …
Question the spider in his lair!
His eyes beheld these things; and with his web he can
A tale unfold horrific to the ear of man:
A tale of cloven belly, feather-filled;
Of nostrils nailed, of skull-bones bashed and spilled;
Of murdered men who from the beams were hung,
And of a babe beside its mother flung,
Its mother speared, the poor chick finding rest
Upon its mother’s cold and milkless breast;
Of how a dagger halved an infant’s word,
Its ma was heard, its mama never heard. …

Descend then, to the cellars of the town,
There where the virginal daughters of thy folk were fouled,
Where seven heathen flung a woman down,
The daughter in the presence of her mother,
The mother in the presence of her daughter,
Before slaughter, during slaughter and after slaughter! …

Turn, then, thy gaze from the dead, and I will lead
Thee from the graveyard to thy living brothers,
And thou wilt come, with those of thine own breed,
Into the synagogue, and on a day of fasting,
To hear the cry of their agony,
Their weeping everlasting.
Thy skin will grow cold, the hair on thy skin stand up,
And thou wilt be by fear and trembling tossed;
Thus groans a people which is lost.
Look in their hearts, behold a dreary waste,
Where even vengeance can revive no growth,
And yet upon their lips no mighty malediction
Rises, no blasphemous oath. …

Speak to them, bid them rage!
Let them against me raise the outraged hand,
Let them demand!
Demand the retribution for the shamed
Of all the centuries and every age!
Let fists be flung like stone
Against the heavens and the heavenly Throne! …

Take thou thy soul, rend it in many a shred!
With impotent rage, thy heart deform!
Thy tear upon the barren boulders shed
And send thy bitter cry into the storm!
The Hebrew-language poet Hayim Nahman Bialik was the great-great-great-granduncle. of actress Mayim Bialik.
Nat Lipstadt Nov 2023
~ one more for patty m. ~

slept late after dancing with my devils, from,
from the wee, until a pealing pearl from the Earl of Dawn,
recovering from an intrusion~invasion~brain~regurgitation,
and it’s nearly 9am, sipping my first cuppa Hawaiian,
& woke to a repost of a ten year old wondering plea(1)

makes me think “This old thing,” poem, like a fav
frock/suit that still drapes perfectly, and yet draws the
***** admiration and drippy drawling yummy compliments,
gracefully, gratefully demurred with them three words,
& it’s 8:39am, Bruce pitching in with “Born in the USA”

recipe for a new thank u Gawd poem to make room for
a fast~break diet for an old man with a rebuilt ticker, this
very emission~transmission of a verbal politesse writ going
some where, cooked on a medium slow burner fueling dressed up seeds of heartfelt appreciation made of ancient oat grasses

birthing a poem~child of thanks to the Lawd for one more day,
opportunity, the five sense’s delivery gratitude and gratifications, and the desire to intertwine the sights, music, a crisp blue November Sky, the need to bleed brew these words into a fulfilling,
second moment mug, for the pearls and Earls

of poetic humans


10:01am
Thu Nov 2 2023
(1) Do You Know Why Men Cry in the Bathroom?
Nat Lipstadt Nov 2023
the cardiologist, in passing, remarks, or perhaps,
“re-marks” my ECG test, casually revealing
that every fifteen or twenty or so of my regularly scheduled
hearts beats, an extra one sneaks it, which appears
unlike all the rest of those normative little hillocks
pointing skyward, ^ ^ ^ V ^ ^ ^ ^
yep that one,

sneaky ****** slips in, pointing downwards
like a class clown always disrupting classroom’s good order…

Doc reassures it don’t mean a thing
if you got that extra swing,  
and our friendly informing internet reassures:

“The idea of your heartbeat going rogue may sound alarming.
But in most cases, an ectopic beat is a harmless condition.
It's also a common one”

but yet I am intrinsically intrigued,
oh yeah, that’s an intentional funny double entendre,
but methinks that explains
so much of my irregular, irreverent poetry scribbling,
particularly because this bratty beat be best addressed directly as:

“You Little Rogue!”

a highly scientific term,
taught in medical schools by non-poets,
but needy for definitions that the layman
can love and keep in their
heart shaped hands…
Sat Oct 28 2023
4:58am
Nat Lipstadt Oct 2023
The “little” Art I Possess

~writ for, inspired by, and warmly dedicated to
Kelly Rose Saccone~

“So an artist does…They say that often when you fill your walls with art you often forget it’s there and you don't absorb its beauty, but I enjoy what little art I have everyday. Sometimes it is just the color or the passion that hits me anew when I look at them.”
KRS

<~>

long ago the new~knowledge,
“newlodge” came brewing~infusing me;
art was not capable of being possessed

my reversal~eyes opened
the senses over~fulfilling,
body sensations brimming,

for I was the container,
only in temporary possession!

the art, in whatever the day’s chameleon guise,
is the professor-possessor, I am the missionary~emissary
remaindered by-product,
just
the vassal~vessel

when to gaze upon a poem~creation of years ago,
my expected mistakes appeared, a wee pride,
largesse of satisfaction, but these are frailties,
weaknesses, human misperceptions,
human ill-delusions!

never

ever was a poem among my possessions,
it was “in-sighted” within me
what was placed in my cupboard,
stored by my sensual conduits,
mine only to covey, not to covet,

art that tempest resides in as part,
a parcel in of the entirety of your body+soul composition,
but “out for delivery,”
seeded, stored & carry~birthed, given forth,
in a completed quantity
that’s so grand,
it takes five senses to truly comprehend!

it is pieces, a child of you,
recombinant,
you the birth sac,
how could ever be assessed as merely

little?

you are better understood to be a translator,
a temp~progenitor,
taking what all of nature and human experience
has installed on your inner walls, and then dispatched,
by you, gestated and unhesitatingly dispatched,

and when gift unwrapped from the plain brown paper of
our now orphaned belly skin,
it is to be hallelujah greeted,
for you, artist, translator, poem~mother,
have done you job, hallowed and sacrosanct,
and now the renewed giant emptiness,
will soon,
needy to be refilled, and
retransmitted once more:

this is no little, limited, mean feat,
your gifting is
beyond any words that limit,
no size constrains,
no words,
neither sufficient and insufficient,
you, are in loco parentis,
you’ve take what you/we are given,
beyond sizing,
and it seizes and is seized,
until you give it away
completed

and that is the grandest art .
inseminated within you,
true artistry!




7:42am
Fri Oct 27
2023
Nat Lipstadt Jan 5
^words of Wislawa Szymborska
(a phrase from her poem  “Some Like Poetry”

———————————

gorge on poetry,
thereby!
imbibe your raison d’etre,
if well examined,
one will be exclaiming:

Exactly!

we on trial from birth,
for having been born sin~innocent,
yet guilty for having allowed
in nighttime light pollution,

one searches for places in
life’s momentary memorabilia,
band~aids, orange lifesavers,
a phrase, photograph, pale bulb light…

these “things,” are our
hitching posts, lean~to,
grasped hungrily for
support whence
negotiating the
steep Spanish Steps
of the staircases of
monumental outrageous misfortune

this poetry,
this poem,
this railing,

sustaining from Day One to
Day T+1 and beyond,
a protuberance of strength
to grab onto before the
shaming of old fails falling,
a head banging despair of barely
hanging on,

unbeknownst to you passerby,
we, who live a life of bare bones,
only mimicking existence, while
questioning Death’s delayed arrival,
and only by,

this poetry,
this poem,
this railing,

sustaining our edge two forward, one back,
cognizant of our awesome missteps,
begging permission, to-liv-liven, a moment more,
offering upon-this altar, a sacrificial lamb,

this poetry,
this poem,
this railing,

sustained in the writing thereof,
expelling the fumes of the

nearly, the never, the hapless hoping

Thu Oct 26 2023
8:15am
x^words of Wislawa Szymborska
(an excerpt from her poem  “Some Like Poetry”

p.m. when the poems grasps me,
my nostrils filled with single breath
good for one more day
Nat Lipstadt Oct 2023
“What can a poem do?”
—————————-


”A poem
is a not a tourniquet
when you’re bleeding.
It’s not water when you’re thirsty
or food when you’re hungry.
A poem can’t protect you from an airstrike,
or from abduction, or from hate.
It’s hard to write when our words feel
like they’re not enough—they can’t do
the real, tangible work of saving lives,
or making people safer.”

(see (1) Maggie Smith)

<~>

as is my wont,
I write,
as is my Natted~inhabited,
retiring to the local watering holes of
Cerebrum & Cerebellum,
them regular haunts,
where all requests are mailed, processed, satisfied & marked;
‘return & render to the sender, who’s on a cerebral ******!’
and that request?

‘give me the words’ (2)

those ‘to do’ words, floaters, direct to top of list,
those ‘can do’ words, that can effect the affect,
spare the despair, realize the fungible, concretize cures,
soften hard waters, giving a worsening worn life fabric a
curated baby blanket feel, a 4-ply human tissue of

‘words that tell me everything’ (2)

salve solution verbs that bounty-wipe spills in entirety,
vacuum up spillage spoiling of 17 days of terrible nouns,
uncovered-unknown rages caused by inflicting prepositions
released a hatred rising,
safety rebury it deeper, drug & destruct the sleeper agents,
and let me start over again with

‘telling me everything by saying nothing’ (2)

the pausal silence, the quieted spaces tween the heartbeats,
where ‘reflection,’
the noun,
and its world of alternations,
reflection,
the noun,
look inwards, but shining outward,
this, this!
is where the poem goes to do!
enervating & arresting

its contradictory powers
rock you into wild docility,
possessive and submissive,
contradictory interferences,
smoothing the roughness,
closing the gaps it opens,
healing the caused truthful cuts,
with words that tell you
everything and nothing,
open the holes, filling the gaps,
that is what a
poem do,
in and by
the manner it is spoken…

<~>

“Sometimes a poem is the stone you carry in your pocket—the one you rub when you’re worried.  Let’s fill our pockets with poems.”
(see (1) Maggie Smith)
(1) Maggie Smith Oct. 24
(see link https://open.substack.com/pub/maggiesmith/p/what-can-a-poem-do

(2) see the lyrics  to”In a  Manner of Speaking”
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