Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
pitch black god8 Aug 2018
~a question of a thousand dreams~^

“Where are you going now my love? Where will you be tomorrow? Will you bring me happiness?  Will you bring me sorrow? All the questions of a thousand dreams, what you do and what you see”

this one composes itself
for all dreams go unremembered
the first, the thousandth, the  every in between,
erased by the push button of opening eyes

but dreams come, marching in, saints mining the raw materiel
the quartermaster has stored, awaiting requisition by an
unarmed unnamed corp, witnessed but never seen

these dreams wisped soft willow budded, tempting taunting,
leaving nothing but unanswered questions that colored come
in black and white

elementary clues,
a pillow indentation,
single hair that stretches
across the sea between two pillows that is blonde or red  
but
certainly unmine,  
dregs of soured sentiment linger like the
aftertaste of too many coffees and stainless steel beers

heated summers breezes give no succor or relief,
and the rain following gives no pleasure,
for now you are hot and soaked,

but somewhere in there a dream is part replayed,
and eyes widening in major league surprise,
the question acknowledged, the dreams quest hinted  

she has gone, neither happiness or sorrow will she
provide on the morrow, no toweling of your wet hair fair,
and you awake sweat besotted, it is not rain, just pain,
and it is only one dream a thousand times repeated

and what you do and what you see
is the abraded night ahead, and
you bitter laugh, for there is no more other than to think,
the question answered, and you beg relief by
uttering
perchance to dream

3:49 pm

see the notes!!


someone accuses me of Plagiarism
because  I did not acknowledge that the quote in marks and Italics was from a famous song written 39 years ago

so here is my response to
“just saying”

congratulations on ******* me off
and yes I agree, you do not know the rules

“#1: Quotation Marks Are for Quoting People—Verbatim
Perhaps it should go without saying, but quotation marks are for quoting people. Quoting doesn’t mean summarizing or paraphrasing; it means repeating exactly what someone said. If you put double quotes around a phrase, your reader will often assume  that someone, somewhere, said that exact phrase or sentence.“

http://thevisualcommunicationguy.com/2013/09/11/10-things-you-really-need-to-know-about-quotation-marks/
lyric  from “Carry On”
by Crosby Stills Nash and Young

which is why it is in quotation marks

but you knew that already

my god strikes me dead ic I ever plagiarized in my life; no splotches of apologies needed
Left Foot Poet Jul 2015
~~~
for our children and their children
~~~

the reason we say so oft,
in whispers emboldened,

I love you

to our children
is not the utility of
its summarizing brevity

no, no.
it is because

the eloquence of simplicity
supersedes any other poem
we could ever write...
~~~

July 26 2015
I have ventured there
and for a while I thought
I would not return
from the realms of the mind
that go beyond this earth.

No words can summarize
the sensation/experience
of existence in a psychedelic state.
The breadth of those
hyper-associations.

Psi.
Time dilation via thought acceleration
.
Nat Lipstadt Oct 2017
once upon a wrote


here and there, in fables and tales,
some in no guile and others
in chancier disguises,
some sine-known and some sign-unknown,
some dead in stillbirth,
some penned these words,
some a few decades old,
some of but a moment ago eyelash distant,
making me think that
someday I will scribe,
cobble some truths and
some falsehoods into one
leaping heaping melting scoop,
letting you decide,
which for better,
which for worse...


<•>

"No matter that plain words
are my ordinary tools,
With them I shall scribe the small,
Cherish the little, grab the middle,
Simplicity my golden rule,
Write they say,
about what you know best,
Surely in the diurnal motions,
The arc of daily commotion,
Do we not all excel?"

<•>

the reason we say so oft,
in whispers emboldened,

I love you

to our children
is not the utility of
its summarizing brevity

no, no.
it is because
the eloquence of simplicity
supersedes any other poem
any of us could ever write...

<•>

is this craft that chose you,
not defined by machine millimeters,
precision absolute,
curvatures, so eye-pleasing,
they demonstrate no tolerance
for tolerance of the ordinary?

the skill of words, too, cut so fine,
find the  extraordinary within,
refine, refine, refine,
shave away the trite,
the reused,
discard the instant recognition,
unusable

<•>

There are natural toxins in us all,
if you wish to understand the
whys, the reasons,
of the nearness of taking/giving away
what soully belongs to you,
do your own sums,
admit your own truths,
query not the lives of others,
approach the mirror...

<•>

The Truth Burden
is the accursed need obligatory,
the sacred sanctity requisitioned,
when the whenever,
chooses to drop in and upflag the mailbox,
an uninvited invitation,
announcing with precise bluntness,
that precisely now,
is the tool crafted moment
and you fool,
the selected tool

you must render unto Ceaser,
by your own hand,
render your own rendering,
do your own undoing,
go forth and in haste,
will thyself into the cauldron of the
Great Mystery of Creation

you cannot lie in poetry

<•>

come, sit for awhile, in poet's nook,
soft pillows for our hard Adirondack chairs,
situe hard by the bay, if too hot, we'll slow
drift to the sun room of
lace curtains and suicide poems,
still we'll observe the water, the rabbits, the cacophony low,
listening to all the noisier, nosier
creatures asking themselves,
and the trees and leaves,
where did all those poets come from?

<•>

to the interior delve,
via brush or limb,
pen or music,
the exposition, the exploration,
the reconstruction of composing
one's self, creation and destruction
of your own myths

movement of arms and legs,
sparseness of simplicity,
subsidiaries of centricity,
tributaries of complexity

<•>

how cold are the carpenter's hands,
the weather, but an added obstacle,
this heat, makes dying different difficult,
the wood bearing cross requires additional nails
and flesh, for the extra load he's bearing,
when it snows blood in Jerusalem

the whole world can transition
when one man dies and another is risen,
where oh where lies then, the juxtaposition?

there is none, for man is man,
his divine spark, embedded,
to his maker's mark, welded and wedded,
neither snow or sun,
can ever extinguish


<•>

now I ken better distance 'tween
artist and art,
I, a workingman's
daily dallying in simplistic machine craft,
my works deservedly lost in
the water-falling
of the endless also rans

non-nebulous distances.between skies of
Oregon country blue and
the worldy worn asphalt grayed words of
a graying man aging,
then let clarity speak, in plainest harmony,
know my deference’s soars to the high above,
one of us at birth, god gifted,
was not I,
it ain't me babe, but
one of us, his tongue,
like Moses-stung
with a hot coal
of language's divinity


<•>
Nat Lipstadt Jul 2016
<>

for the early morning teach

<>

she's young, beautiful and thinks her life is cursed,
in the past, subject of some of my poems, her health to nurse,
yet, as is normative, you fall into & out of a well of touch,
until you accidentally once again path cross,
she provides a precision mathematical status update

"i'm fairly certain things are like at least 38% worse."

it is 1:38AM for you,
the not unnoticed ironic minute and hour
when the night ether has prematurely worn off,
rising time close but not nearly close enough,
a dark dose of a sleeping nurse's aide seems inappropriate,
and TV reruns seem like an insult to your brain

instead you turn on some belle string musique,
a Grande Messe des Morts,
a chorus,
singing a high mass for the dead,
while opening all your various email luggage and baggage,
smiling as you read a poetess's message of
laughter behind tears

"i'm fairly certain things are like at least 38% worse."

and Mississippi ******,
your uncontrollable mixed drink of her emotional
Grenada grenade cocktail,
flavored with musique, paintings, and words and a nearby beloved's
gentling sleep sounds,
has you writing your own protest poem,
your very own,
oy vey, grande messe,
about lives that were supposed to be
pictures of perfect artistry
and for but a word or two,
instead, a painting of a life that got hung upside down,
and indeed,
leaving a grand mess and no one to help clean up


alternatively weeping, laughing as you are thinking,
smiling recall
Laurel and Hardy's summary definition
of living a life's of ill begotten, misventured adventures:

"Well, here's another nice mess you've gotten me into !"

but 38% worse?

not an even-steven rounded up 40%,

should I write you only 38% of a poem, teach?
or more accurately, more mathematically,
138% of what was writ before?

and you recall your older, prior words
about the love hate affair between
you poet,
and the beauty of written brevity
(her style)

and you give her this then,
this rambling, scrambled, attention paid notification,
word attentiveness, a summary of your readings
of her cheddar sharp and honey mustard sweet retorts of
pained poetry,

it is insufficiently but perfectly sufficient,
a summarizing phrase that opens
and yet
briefly encapsulates all that
you are feeling for her

"thinking of you"

or the 38% larger version thereof -


*"Well, here's another 38% more
nice poetic mess
you've gotten me into!"
2:44 AM,
of course
one of those fancy 10 word poems I see so often
I tried to write the truth
Skypath Sep 2014
She
Extra lessons after school
Explaining how you are not yourself
Such small words used so simply
Cut like knives through your chest
'She'

Paraphrasing arguments
Summarizing discipline
Faceless family with too much on their own plate to understand
Why you don't like what's on yours
'She'

Tightness in your chest not because your binding is too small
But because it isn't
The name of a state has never hurt so much
'She'

You look in the mirror and grimace
Shower so fast you don't have to see yourself
Roll their words in your mind until you're leaning over the toilet
'She'

Humming summer days fade into early autumn nights
Long days enforce what they have already told you
Dress code laws repeated by tongue
And hasty dressing in changing rooms
Hoping they won't notice you
'She'

But you are an active volcano
There are wolves in your chest and lions in your brain
And they can't change you
You get home and look in the mirror and sign into skype
A simple word that only drops one letter
Has never had so much power

He.
onlylovepoetry Jul 2016
<>


so she says...

your mouth suddenly goes Gobi Desert dry,
somehow manage a single swallow,
sounding as loud as if you've cracked
all twelve of you pistol-toting open carry knuckles simultaneous

****, as ridiculous as I sounded,,
it can't be worse than my succinct, elegant,
pithy response of a choking, but interrogatory
                                                   ­                              ahem?


(translation: excuse me, what did you say,
are you crazy, and did I hear you correctly
and are you completely crazy?)

then that awful pause
as you wait for
further guidance
from her mission control,
a scientifically measurable and
unendurable two shakes of a lamb's tail
(10 nanoseconds in atomic scientist lingo)

while that interminable wait drags on and on,
you manage to prepare an Old Testament long
and truly impressively worthy sing-song
list of variegated absurd follow up responses,
including:

- **** those ten pounds that summer slipped on so quietly
- is she really that crazy
- does she really think you're that crazy
- really? naked naked? (as opposed to just naked),
   or just in a, uh, a bathing suit?
- hot ****! there is a first time for e v e r y t h i n g!
- mmmm, what's she really after?
- am I going to be an Internet instantaneous super star?
- but I'm not tan down you know where
- she's just making fun of a really old man
- that's gross (or more accurately,      
   "I am so gross looking i.e. **** those ten pounds")
- yeah baby
- and the concluding eloquent summarizing thought of:
"make me an offer I can't refuse"
  which sounds suspiciously
  in your aged brain sadly like
                                                                                "you talking to me?"


then she laughs sweetly and says,
not naked, naked pictures silly,
just those poems where you bare your soul,
reveal more
of your core,
ones where we get to peek
(peak? couldn't resist) inside,
that comely come, studded,
(surely she must of meant studly,
says my semi-wounded pride)
that brain
you try to disguise
from where you draw
equal measures of pleasure & pain,
revealing yourself and so,
revealing us as well,
in a publicly secret way


cloyingly, subtly, adding
in a man-killing seductive  manner,
"after all that's a kind of love poem too,
is that not so?"
dancing me into submission, knowing,
that when Wanda-Goldfish like,
elle répète en français,
est-ce pas?"
there is no question who's the master
and who will be role playing the obedient
slave to poetry

oh well...

Sic transit gloria mundi, all glory is fleeting..

but still,

that's a not half bad compliment....

so I reply

you know there is a very
steamy seamy dark side to me

and as proof,
and in fulfillment
of her request,

I gave her this love poem

                                                and no telling what happened next
4:21am, of course
Arlene Corwin Sep 2020
Summarizing Something Nice💞

I’m so happy when you ‘get it’;
That you get its subtleness -
The latent and the unexpressed.

Happy that there’s one who takes on board
The theme, the art, both intertwined
In effort’s mind.
Just happy - nothing more
With not a jot of longing for the glory
Or the possibility of money.

As the jazzer makes the song her own,
The notes and chords and lyric one,
The improv, playing, unified,
Theme, technique grown,  
Thus, sweat and fuss,
The sugared press of muse and genius,
Poet builds on stuff and nonsense,
Common sense, the mystical, ,
The mundane-******-metaphysical-potential endless.
It’s all nice:
Expression giving peace to practice,
Practice peace.
With you the object of release.

Summarizing Something Nice 9.26.2020 The Processes: Creative, Thinking, Meditative II; Vaguely About Music II; Circling Round Experience; Arlene Nover Corwin
Proust kept a log of his  untidy mind
inviting readers in to sink, or swim
some find their thoughts are much of the same kind
some feel it's all particular to him
great literature ought to resonate
but still meets a diversity of taste
those hawthorn blossoms of his endless prate
some readers find a shapeless verbose waste
a shorter form fits my attention span
of seventy iambs in rhyming verse
within a reader's mind I dare hope can
evoke a self-consistent universe
a monument to years spent pent in bed
Marcel's rich life was mostly in his head
Nat Lipstadt Mar 2019
Poem Analysis

1st read, I thought gibberish,
2nd I thought Hmmm,
3rd I thought interesting,
4th I felt genius
.  billy


your poem comment-dissects my poem
my process,
a marathon interview for a new poem pole position,
limb by limb, word by word,
chewed and re-chewed,
like a tiring piece of bubble gum,
the flavor remaining ebbs, but is not extinguished,
and can live in your mouth,
forever

and the praise and this poem,
not a rodomontade,
for your comment dear Billy,
is the process description of a poet’s labor,
from word first to a baby’s birth,

gibberish into genius

emergent from first pain, then pushing, then tilled, at long last,
the dirtiest immaculate conception beautiful

billy reads my rambling, silly abstruse^ & wrote me:
1st read I thought gibberish,
2nd I thought Hmmm,
3rd I thought interesting,
4th I felt genius


this is a much loved critique
for I well recall each step of creation,
a summarizing parallel
that your words+genes replicated so well,
forgiving you a minor typo, Billy,

it was genus, not genius that you meant

(but then again, why quibble over a miscellaneous, harmless, delighting, tiny little  extra i...not me, said he, my muse ego )

Billy has gone gray dotted, but his dot, his comment,
with gratitude,
in me, he,
lives for ever

I feel gibberish coming on...
Nat Lipstadt Feb 2023
Compare and Contrast (the foliage of the heart)



<>

My work is loving the world.
 Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird - 
equal seekers of sweetness.
 Here the quickening yeast; there the blue plums.
 Here the clam deep in the speckled sand.
Are my boots old? Is my coat torn?
 Am I no longer young and still not half-perfect? Let me
 keep my mind on what matters,
which is my work, which is mostly standing still and learning to be astonished.
The phoebe, the delphinium.
 The sheep in the pasture, and the pasture.
 Which is mostly rejoicing, since all ingredients are here,
Which is gratitude, to be given a mind and a heart
and these body-clothes,
 a mouth with which to give shouts of joy
 to the moth and the wren, to the sleepy dug-up clam,
 telling them all, over and over,
how it is
 that we live forever.


This is the first poem in Mary Oliver's collection Thirst, titled,
“The Messenger."

<>

Ruler of the Universe, grant me the ability to be alone; may it be my custom to go outdoors each day among the trees and grass among all growing things - and there may I be alone, and enter into prayer, to talk with the One to whom I belong.

May I express there everything in my heart, and may all the foliage of the field - all grasses, trees, and plants - awake at my coming, to send the powers of their life into the words of my prayer so that my prayer and speech are made whole through the life and spirit of all growing things, which are made as one by their transcendent Source. May I then pour out the words of my heart before Your presence like water, O L-rd, and lift up my hands to You in worship, on my behalf, and that of my children!


-Rebbe Nachman of Bratslav

<>

too early on a Sunday morning for a trick or treat question,
still bed-bound @ Nine AM, browsing the internet state of the world,
it’s pre-my-walk on First Ave., in my Manhattan
concrete habitat pasture, where it’s gray and grayer
reveals of raggedy grass, certainly no sheep, and the only flowers
arrayed will be those with price tags fronting the bodegas
that are busy preparing breakfast for thousands of New Yorkers

trick question?

indeed! there is NO contrast, save the compare the kinetic similitude
of three kinfolk prayers, amidst frightfully unchanging headlines of
the dreary state of the world - weather report prototypical,
war, death & destruction, whiny celebrities and sports “heroes,”
editorials preaching, a vast quietude of no one’s mind changed,

but, always the but…

my work is loving the world, the grimy solitary blades of grass, true survivors, hosted & sprouting in dirt cracks miraculously,
letting the foliage of my heart blossoming in early morn warmth within my body’s extremities, clothed coverings of wintery wool,
confess my facts (“no longer young and still not half perfect?”),
filling the styrofoam cups of begging, wretched yearning refuse,
planting sprigs of mint green dollars in blanched froze hands,
wondering to myself, which one is
the masked messiah?

these are the growing things in my fields, 70 years familiar,
the fruits and flowers of my life, are street crated>corners,
a panoply of vest corner garden-parks,
and the people!
people of every color and shade, what variety hath man wrought?


my eyes lack
not for anything, plenty the stimuli joyous within the astonishing spirit and life of all things blooming in hostile soil and you
may yet see the mark of
Abel joy upon my forehead, in my eyes, and see lips whispering this prayer~poem while being birthed, but in a word, a single word,
a pouring, best summarizing of a rebbe’s blessing
shouting out, anointing, appointing:


~Hallelujah~


Sun Feb 19 2023 9:15 AM
NYC
lipstadt
Meg B Aug 2015
The breath in my chest
Scraped against my esophagus
As the preacher read his
Introductory scripture and a
Mourning loved one doubled over
In grief and despair as she
Struggled to bid adieu;

The hairs on the back of my neck
Stood horizontally and
Perpendicular to my concrete floor
As I heard the sweetest soul I know
Choke on her sobs on the
Other end of the receiver,
As she struggled to understand
The onset of pain and finality
She was forced to swallow;

My stomach hollowed and
Acidic anger bubbled and carved out my insides
When I read my best friend's texts,
A series of words
That seemed too cruel to be true,
A riffraff of  interrogatories and
Unsettled punctuation,
Summarizing the momentary suspension
Of her resiliency
As she processed the
Breaking of her heart;

And now I lay motionless
On my mattress,
Hot tears masquerading behind my
Tightened eyelids as I writhe in
Empathy,
Alone in my incapability
To end the pains and the woes of
Those around me,
As my body thus must then grieve
For me.
Nat Lipstadt Dec 2014
Our Verse into Psalm

"who massages our words
into a masterpiece,
our verse into psalm..."

sourced from a dialogue one year ago: http://hellopoetry.com/poem/548741/the-contriving-is-all-that-remains/

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
humbling words,
just now discovered,
a reflection invitation,
commenced and ended,
an essay of simple facts

two topics theme,
revealing a man's evolution

a confession oft repeated,
he writes too much, (used to)
a readily apparent truth

but when the self-soul-peering
hits bottom,
forced to reflect
back and up, and around,
acknowledging self is a four letter word,
a poking from reviewing
a year ago gone prior scribbled response,
leads to a conclusion
to answer his puzzlement

easy acknowledges
he has prior peaked,
certified and certifiable,
his best words gone by,
bye and bye,
so how now antiquated,
this tiresome task
of endless interior internal examination,
once more
he asks of himself
the Psalmist's question (121:1)


"I lift my eyes up to the mountains:
From whence shall my help come?


from you,
y'all

my poems are now and will be
just stories told,
stories of you

of a lost wedding ring,
of a young woman's striving
to answer her most essential question,
reflections on being four years old,
on Eastern Seaboard geography
Thanksgiving Day air turbulence,
a young woman's sobriety celebrated,
her poetry, richer and health effused,
of lovers who cannot ever be,
of jobs lost and freedom gained,
physical pain that knows only
the optics of poetic relief to salve,
aching and unrequited awed and flawed love
that has no remedy defusing,
older schemers, puppy love rediscoverers,
of special young men
who see by their nature,
far better into
nature's window that answers the human soul,
children foreign born, here & passed,
whom I have never met, but,
who are poems
dearest in my breast,
as if, no,
as they are mine own...

and on and on

could travel and travail,
but the clickety clock says
bread to be earned,
wistfulness hour over,
all that's need is a conclusive,
one octave,
a summarizing single note,
a lady last rinsing of the soul

your stories are my psalms,
your heartache and triumphs
my masterpieces,
thy foibles are my filament,
your stories, my revelations

turned my eyes to the mountains,
seeing only my own mountains,
that engulf and surround,
hearing a single,
simple voice answering,
it is their mountains
that deserve written attention,
and therein and thereby
can you write humbly
and walk upright
^
^Psalm 37:37
Nat Lipstadt Jan 2016
~~

First & Foremost

~~~
a friendly competition,
not of erudition,
more a contest of
speedy eruption

who will be first,
for quenching their thirst,
on not any but only
every,
day of their togetherness,
to declare, swear, affirm,
that their love for the other
is the greater


a race
where both win,
by crossing the
ever-moving forward,
the unfinished line

a never static series,
much more than merely being
a claimant of a trite first place,
more akin
to momentarily being
at the head of an unending
mathematical
progression,
(1 + 1 > 2)
solvable if and when
leap frogging
over each other,
extending their combined reach

when one is
first
to pronounce
this daily blessing
at the
beginning of the
new awakening twenty four,
of their joint custodied
imprimatur,
silently implied,
I love you
with a simple syrup summary



first and foremost

one, if by pillowed whisper
two, if by text

a succint messag to the other,
their love is coming fresh direct,
with an invading intensio,
deserving recognition
that a new edition will be
published
on this very day,
with the
same exact
freshly steaming coffee'd,
bannered headline,
that my love for you,
my darling sweetheart is


first and foremost

condensing with a
yellowing smiley face,
in these illiterate days of emoticons,
unacceptable,
yellow carded,
though summarizing acceptable as

F & F
or
1st/most


formats
that have been adjudged
to be
an A-Ok entry,
in the contest
without a foreseeable ending
and

that no one,
but only both,
can possess
the winning record


~~~
6:21am
Jan. 9, 2016
nyc
Jamie Santoro Oct 2010
she's running toward me.
full on. not stopping. this is it.
the kiss to end all kisses.
***** "the titanic".
***** "the notebook".
we're the real deal.
should I run to meet her? should I stay and let her come to me? wow, I have a lot of responsibility in this.
she's getting closer.
god, I missed her.
I hate space. we didn't need space. I just need to get to her. hold her. that would make this moment perfect.
that and rain. rain would help. make this seem more cinematic.
I digress.
BAM.
she's here. in my arms. en mi brazos.
warm to touch. sweet to smell.
her face is buried in my chest. she's breathing heavy, trying to inhale me.
we stand still, filing these moments in our minds.
she lifts her head and looks in me.
her eyelids are red and puffy, remnants of tears linger. but her eyes are deep. clear, blue, and deep.
I know what she's thinking.
she's thinking what I’m thinking.
fireworks. explosions. BOOM! impact.
she's is summarizing her entire speech into this one action.
her "I’m sorry”‘s.
her "I missed you”‘s.
especially her "I love you”‘s.
all summarized in one pleasant forceful kiss.
this kiss feels amazing yet it feels new.
this kiss isn't a "we should have ***/peer pressure" kiss where both our minds are elsewhere.
nor is it "hello/goodbye" peck.
this kiss is real. it has passion and fire. It is deep and selfless. It’s an expression not a formality.
don't get me wrong; it's not a gross sloppy "get a room" kiss. there is no groping or petting, heavy or otherwise.
it is indescribable.
it feels like it lasts second and years at the same time.
it is so good yet bad because I know I will never feel that without having to feel great pain first.
losing her, even if it was only for a small period of time, was unbearable.
when she eventually did pull away I tried to think of something appropriate and clever.
I thought and though and then, "I love you" came out.
that’s it? that’s all I could come up with? I could do better.
but then I realized.
I couldn't.
there was nothing better.
I loved her more than I could put into any other words.
yeah I ripped off a Natasha Beddingfeild song but it was true.
I couldn't think of anything catchy or witty.
just I love you.
simple and easy and most of all, true.
Liv D Nov 2011
beautiful words written across paper
so many thoughts and dreams
put to rhythm
many scattered reminiscences
all put into one small paragraph
summarizing that person’s life
feelings put into words
words put into thoughts
thoughts put into dreams
dreams put to rhythm
poetry.
Odysseus Apr 2015
I have fear of seeing you, necessity of seeing you, hope of seeing you, uneasiness of seeing you.
I have eagerness of finding you, worry of finding you, certainty of finding you, poor doubts of finding you.
I have urgency of hearing you, happiness of hearing you, good luck of hearing you and fearfulness of hearing you.
So to speak summarizing, I'm ****** and radiant, perhaps more the former than the last and also vice versa.
Nat Lipstadt Apr 2016
alliteration intervening invasion,
a bed-throned life journey summarily unasked for, reviewing

follow behind the collected beaming seams,
to the discolored end-of-a-whiting rainbow of writings

sack in hand, sack'd yet surfeiting,
gleaning the falling bits,
inventoried stories, the poor and the glorious

light droppings,
stir'd and stor'd in hopsack bag,
woven intervals of clashing fabrics

trilogy of
me, myself and I,
following falling, trailing, failing flalings

cross currenting, swirling,
disheartened chest heaving cursing
if only, a mite more sipping
of courage everlasting

here a memory,
there a visionary,
happy haunting,
glaceing eye dreams

keepsakes of a life
modesty and poorly lived
error prone, choices weak,
father confessor to the supremity of oneself

played safety first,
thirst quenching
with the unsatisfying yellowed bursts
of "it could be worse"

but these stuffing,
gleanings of a life,
uprighted night, declining days, admixture of son and moon,
women's flashing eyes inviting
happy danger and ending disaster inevitability

this sifted treasure chest
of self-selected retained
cursings and blessings,
the measuring cup of a tragedy
well acted, quantifiable pathos superb aplenty

a play veined with comedic relief,
a Falstaff for every Hal,
compare and contrast
your essays on the container storage
of dusted cells morning-mourning

summarizing gleams gleaned from a life well....dissatisfaction satisfied...truth in poetry
Endless darkness envelops the young girls classroom
She sobs silently awaiting her nightly lesson
His shadow looms with her in his toxic embrace
Her heart stops
So does time and space
Suspended and vulnerable- she is schooled
He forces down her cries of wrong answers with manipulative lips
And whispers his answers in her young ears
As if she can understand him
He doesn't care as his hands begin to creep
She tenses
Knowing whats to come
A routine pop quiz  
Her instincts scream at her to simply skip
It wasn't mandatory, she could walk away
She doesn't
She knows what must be done
His hands still creep
A whimper breaks from its cage
So does a glimpse of his rage
A pain in her side
Reminds her not to say a peep
Or pass the notes summarizing his lessons
His destination reached
As if bleached
Her color slowly fades
Her essence
Once a plethora of iridescent lights
Now chained to his chalk stained hands
Are as black as an eclipsed sun
Knowing nothing else but his lessons
She obediently lays
She tries to clear her mind
Focus on her answers
Tries to leave whats left of herself behind
Distractions weren't acceptable
Wanting simply nothing more
Then for her life to be like it was before
Before pop quizes
And true or false test
Before projects displaying your talents
The talents teacher spent weekends making sure she knew like the back of her small hands
But teacher needs her focused
Though her cries are no longer caged
They go unnoticed
Why would teacher care to notice?
He was teaching!
She trembles with the pain
All the hatred and disdain
Emotions cloud her head
The questions began to run together
Adding to her dread of another lessons end
She prays that soon it will be over
But not everthing has been covered
And teacher is always sure to be thorough
The young girl is panicked
Once again she can't keep up
She is lost
As a result, her work suffers
While teacher grades her work
His rage is unleashed
All her answers are still wrong!
Class was over
But detention was waiting
ogdiddynash Sep 2019
the permanent shaving cut (why god made humans cut)

~for my father~

in the class of men
who need a scrubbing shave
I am, a twice a day him-hymnal

to keep the face pliant,
the cheeks smoothied,
in case some young children
come visiting, needing kissing,
by a funny-foolish Poppy

hell, I shave before I go to bed
cause I sleep shirtless,
my chin’s scruff cuts my shoulder
that badly, that here I am, awoken,
writing ******* poetry at 5:09am

but the specific cut requesting a poem
all for its lonesome is actually a newlywed pinch,
where the straying, whirring blades grabbed ahold
of the soft tissue flesh beneath the eyes,
where the no-sleep, permanently black stained “circles” live,
those tree rings of the human body

shaving cuts...what’s the big deal!

this one painful, sending out a weather alert to the brain, saying:

“Hello old friend, this red busted blood cell,
that’s me, is now a permanent resident,
a red badge of stupidity (yours),
a forever face fixture that will be
a pallbearer at your funeral,
jump into your grave with you,
for one last final deep dive drive-by screaming”

so now when I shave,
this perfect red light signal of a cautionary tale,
smiling remindingly to stick to the round and fleshy fat parts,,
pale red cheekiness where the only natural indentation are
two **** dimples - the ones no longer visible,
under the stubble of a life now measured in
too many decades

why do we cut ourselves?

(now grow serious)

not for fashion,
a scratcher beards an even greater skin-ny irritant,
this human gesture, this marker of the
daily changing leaves coloring,
this forced to mirror-address
who is that person vision we’ve never before met,
with ridged furrowed forehead,
and every day older markings appliqués,
summarizing a race to some ending,
that pulling weeds from the ground
or the **** grounds of your face,
is endlessly pointless but necessary,
a god given way to say fool!
you’ve been given a mo’ day,
and another night, wake up,
do something useful


kiss those babies too much,
write many short poems,
do a goodun,
remember,
this day,

for when you see that red dot mark of living,
it’s just another signage of closer to dying,
no use in denying, use this memory well
to make yourself attractively useful and

maybe,
some other human apparition might
come along and you’ll be reminded
smooth is better n’ gruff,
and thus shaving
helps perpetuate
the species.

Ogdiddynash
5:51am two days after they came for my moneystream in two naught nineteen
oggdiddynash
Intrigued about cremation,
I sought GOOGLE to assuage curiosity
significant questions answered
clicking the following website
https://www.funeralwise.com/plan/
cremation/cremation-process/

though summarizing article
some oven death defying act,
yet summarization satisfactorily completed,
thus herewith briefly describes
kickstarting, mystifying, pulverizing...
tantalizing, yielding, enterprising, lasting,

yelping, holding, surviving dearly departed
1. deceased identified
2. official cremation authorized
affiliated with deceased
3. lifeless body prepared
4. medical devices removed

5. jewelry recovered
6. corpse secured
into burnable cremation receptacle
7. encased entity transferred
to retort i.e. cremation chamber
8. temperature range adjusted

between 1400 degrees -
1800 degrees Fahrenheit
9. 1.5 - 2 hours elapsed
10. magnet applied
residual metal removed

11. remains ground into ashes
12. once process completed
remains secured within urn
13. family representative entrusted
with ashes.

Burnt offerings distributed
ideally according to stated
wishes of beloved,
whose remembrance sustained
as tears expended
necessary to mourn
eventually sorrow lessened,
photographs visited
after crushing grief decreased.
Nat Lipstadt Nov 2020
when you accept the ‘I love you’ invite, coolly quietly
understanding this is but a summarizing way of saying,
let’s enter the gated fence to friendship, locking in & out,
the delving reveals to follow are truths more costly than
any fiction, you see only the too real, how much pain can
exist, survive, be survived, quietly thrive, just beneath the
skin’s preternatural strong thinness, holding us in, together
while yet a sieve, separating the granules of our composition,
the coarser fail to penetrate the finer cells, the molecular level
is where the sensory Alice in Wonderland world coexists with
the blunt exhaustion of so much agony, too much, and in the
early morn these words appear of their owned and freed volition,

do what you must do to repair yourself

...and you confess to understanding that to heal oneself,
you must heal others, and that separate and unequal
sorrows can somehow heal each other, praying for ex,
exfoliation, exhumation, excalibur, expelling all the ex’s
so new skin self repairs, a great miracle that, and that
human reparations are a thing you alone initiate, inhale,
fostering a belief that !we! is the solution, the only...

5:46am
11/28/20
for those who will understand instantly, willingly and gasp at the recognition...
Valentines Day of 93, a star was birthed to the world
extremely gifted from the womb with big things to unfurl
A broke product growing up on the streets of Lynchburg
Red Top to be exact with a message to the world waiting to be heard
At the age of 9, he found his passion by scanning thru old notebooks
that his mom kept private with her thoughts of cold world that’s been shook
The process began by summarizing what he read thru the English text
slowly got good with it but the question remained, what’s next?
Senior year of high school, the unthinkable would take place
one individual would turn heads from his diary of hidden hate
felt from those around him & from those who did him wrong
expressing how he was breaking down inside & didn’t know how to be strong
A nervous wreck before getting on stage to confess his inner feelings
but finished it like a concert to hear the applause raising up to the ceiling
But that was years ago & sometimes I question if I’m really star worthy
like I should keep my poems to myself cause this world doesn’t deserve me
but it makes me think of the things that I’d like to achieve
or the other people who need my guidance to believe
How could I be the star in my mind if the spotlight which is mine that I’m scared to possess
then to hear those who admire me tell me that I’m the best
Yea a star was born on that cold Sunday evening but seeing that star shine scares me
yet the feeling of overcoming the odds still manages to compel me
☆ Poetic Venom ☆
Nat Lipstadt Oct 2019
Variations on OK: “I'm ok... as in just okay :)“

ah, me making the global rounds,
with the poem interns in tow, observing poet patients,
me, the anti-troll meme, asking the lonely legions,
“what’s up, just checking in,”

responsa included the nuanced range of variations
of the simplest terms,

Variations on OK: “I'm ok... as in just okay :)“

the normal curve of emotional disturbances, falling mists,
category 5 storms and verbal cover-up girl makeup all represented by
OK

this, then, the OK stuff of human poetry, the plain, the innocuous, inadmissible guiltily non-confessions that are the infectious complexity of heartache, humongous jealousy of those surficially
just innocently happy, those who fear of failing,
longing for what was and can not be true once more,
so with not-even-a-serious-word a reminder of our masks when meeting Quo Vadis,
the replies come in summarizing shades of:

OK: “I'm ok... as in just okay :)“

a perfectly good response, shadings and gradations
that shout volumes deserving of interpretations, talmudical exegesis,
across continental contestation,^^^meaning obviously that the contra-opposite is likely what’s meant,
all indirect giving access when delving into their abyss,
as in the rock n’ roll verse states,

“just dropped in to see what condition your condition is in”^

okay.

yes, it’s true okay is better than not okay,
which is better than the catch all meaningless of the
OK....the one, that dribbles off into air hanging, silent albatross

but the insertion of the modifier

just

makes the meaning of the fully, half born, sentence summation diagrammable except
OK
is not valid in life size, grownup version game  of Scrabble(d) hearts

this is how I spend my everyday vacation days
exploring everything human

the graze of a hand, the longest slow journey of a singlet tear,
a child’s shrieking glee, the nightmares gasps
when they woke the awoken,
the intelligible whimpering vocabulary of the new born innocent,
the spackled, patching of the speckled cracking of the
semi-autonomous, wish-it-wasn’t human,
my, busted-heart

so when two lovers continental shelves do not meet,
but graze each other, altering the landscape of emotions,
OK, just, okay is
sedimentary weak but perfect

you are the interloper ghost,
who now asks “how ya doing,”
the famous just “checking in,”
and
in the sliding spaces where mountain ranges get created,^^^

the O in Okay is a black hole disguised

I'm ok... as in just okay :)”

though this is a Buffalo Springfield “ain’t exactly clear”
you accept and understand for aching hearts are the
specialty of the maison

and that is all I have to say on the matter.

OK?
<>

3:21am Monday September 30 ~ 10:38pm Friday October 4, 2019
This is,
A quick attempt at sketching the overall picture,
A collection of existing material,
Summarizing the essential characteristics,
And offering a novel interpretation of
The “self-actualizing personality.”
And the gifts,
That set them apart,
And that are underutilized,

They are,
Misunderstood,
And underestimated,
By peers,
By society,
And by themselves.

The gifted rarely fulfill,
Their full creative potential.
This is particularly true,
For gifted women,
They don’t fit stereotypes,
Society has,
Either of women,
Or the gifted:
Typically seen as men.

The highly gifted are rare,
In the population.
Those with IQ’s,
Of 150 and above,
Occur five to seven times,
Per ten thousand.
They are never quite sure,
If it is good,
Or bad,
To be very bright.
It is difficult,
For average persons,
To identify,
With their gifted counterparts’
Superior cognitive abilities.
If feedback is internalized,
A self-conception,
May be constructed,
Based on underrating the self.

They are experiencing in a higher key.
Indeed

this important and yet impotent word,
sometimes hurled with mighty scorn,
or quiet whispered ruefully reflectively,
empowering, yet so weakly confessional, that
it is a word equally reveling in overarching wonder,
or a summarizing a simplicity of inability,
to surrender by weak agreement…

indeed,
 that selfsame word,
indeed,
I’ve employed usage unthinkingly casually,
mis-appreciating its power of causality,
used so often in poems, slipping it in to the
hilt, succinct dagger of irony, killing easily,
and yet only 17
thousand
poems of the mega-thousands here,
have been designated with the honorific
*#indeed
Nathan Horkstrom Nov 2015
Lost in the forest of memories,
The map of depression is the only guide i see.
****** razors, burning glass,
Death and darkness is all i ask.
Summarizing this story this paper will shred,
Asking for this to be over, asking for death.
Close my eyes and there you will be,
Open my eyes and all i see is me.
Where did you go when i needed you most,
the love you claimed to felt was just a hoax.
I know i will find my love, this is for sure,
Lost without a map, in search for her.
Missing her.
Faleeha Hassan Sep 2019
Oh, my god
This poem!
Whenever I try to make her stand on the reality line
She flutters like Marilyn Monroe’s dress in the imaginations of men
I tell her to keep herself on one meaning
But she defies me
While wearing the interpretation mask
And when she tries to describe the battlefield
She is looking for the effects of kisses
On the collars of the soldiers who are tied down in their trenches
With fear and hopelessness
But if they were to be blown up
And their bodies were every where
Her words would be meaningless
For she hiding behind symbolism
She can’t sense the children’s horror from the bombs
And their attempts to huddle against the remnants of destroyed walls
Her cheeks do not hurt
Like mothers’ cheeks dried of their hot tears poured while waiting for deferred letters from their absent sons
She does not take the risk of thinking
So, she can’t believe any truth
She does not pay attention to my damaged life
Which has been crushed by the harsh machine of days
She is trying to make her words beautiful
So, she sprinkles rose water on an erupting volcano
She is too comfortable with death and even praises him
She is summarizing all this loss, darkness, combustion, destruction, chemical weapons. black banners, coffins, skinning , deprivation, orphanages, curfews, warning, sirens, barbed wire, tanks, thrumming of planes, explosions. ******. blood shed on the side walk, death, ashes, displacement, emptiness, charred bodies, mass graves, coffins, body traps, yelling, sadness, anger, hunger, thirst, vigilance, slapping …. etc.
She summarizes all of this in one ward
War
While I am, the poet stand in the middle
Watching my body jump from death to death
For nothing
Just to let the poem come
But after all this trouble
She only comes imperfectly
Poetoftheway Feb 2020
Love Letters to & between Men

are composition easy, the components, blunt edged,
declarations of affection, without affectation

verses but not stanzas, are all that required,
homer direct, no fanciful piping, no trimming needed

your strength, character, manly wistfulness,
gives me leave to grasp your shoulders all about

no feverish whispers, no cloaked hush, delicately interfering,
only an “I love you man,” a simple declarative compositional

firmly pronounced, eye to eye, hand to shoulder embraces,
acknowledged with crinkly eyed smile, met with a summarizing

“me too.”



2/12/2020
2:25am
Reza Sedghi Sep 2020
I died as i sip, the last inch drop of memories...
Tasteless, unfragrant, fragmented vacancies...

Recollecting, regulating the blurry negligible visions...
Recalling, rewriting, summarizing the Summaries

It felt like Treachery, disregarding this treasury...
life is a Memory, and then it is nullity...

Or at least that's what the wise man said...

We drown ourselves in each shot and swim out with a sigh
Sometimes with a gloom and sometimes with a smile

But in the end, both fades away,
And oh how quickly they fade away...

As if waves washing away our names written on the shore...
it fades out to presence, to sense another sore

sores, like old chest boxes, we dive deep in each,
swimming into it's memories, bone narrow they breached

like Leeches, we **** on our melancholy as we silently screech
watching pains as days turning to wrinkles, as closer we reach

We build our future, though we live for the past...
We all get obsessed and we all get attached...
We move forward to looking back trying to find a meaning...
But after all, Life is a memory, and then it is nothing...

Or at least that's what the wise man said
Been a long time since i haven't write anything, tried to keep up
jeffrey conyers Jul 2017
Criminal minds faces reality.
A prisoner sits behind walls summarizing his case.
Without comprehending your decision put you in this place.

Maybe from ******.
Maybe from robbery.
Maybe from ****.
Maybe from various illegal crimes.

You , now ask for counsel to get you off.
Crying to family's members about your circumstances behind the prison walls.

Crying about rules and regulations governing you.
And the correctional officers enforcing them as required.
But while you pondering this or that about serving your time.

Remember, your decision placed you there.
Not your mother, not your father, not your woman.
John Destalo Mar 2019
She fell into
      Captions, summarizing
    her Raw
             Emotions
           unAware
            the Mounting
                     Empty space
                was Devouring her
Shivani Lalan Apr 2019
stories often like taking strolls
sometimes in solitude,
sometimes in the company of
some others,
so long as they are happy and their
sentences seem to
subtly dissolve into one another.

stories talk to each other the most -
summarizing days and nights
stuttering on some horribly
scribbled words,
squinting at some alien scripts,
sure to trip on half-baked lines.

stories are the only ones who truly and
surely live in the moment.
somehow, they are fully aware that
sections of their lives may never
see the light of day.
still, they persist in haunting
sleepless souls burning all kinds of oil
so as to make their homes on
semi-wrinkled,
       semi-stained,
   semi-torn,
semi-ingrained paper.

stories often forget that they might be incomplete -
so they dress up,
stars and strikes and notes and all,
sashay down pages - company or alone,
slowly turn to you and almost
silently tell you to have hope.
someday, they promise,
someday they will return to you, in the
shape of an unknown familiarity,
silhouettes of a dream dreamt at 4 AM, or
shower thoughts
spelt out on walls and curtains.

stories have a habit of making
sure that no matter when they leave,
some parts of them will always be
safe with you.

stories don't mind leaving,
so long as you promise that their lives will always be
seen in the
shadows of what you promised you would write.
Prompt : the idea of an incomplete story (originally by 2 authors, but i modified it to some extent) - Credits: Darshil Shah <3
Nope Nov 2018
I could write a thousand words
Just summarizing what I read between yours
But I don't, or I won't
I think it's time to let "this"
ride off into the sunset
The horizon has been patient
and enough is probably enough
So, I'll say goodbye
For now, or forever I guess
I think the only lesson
We are meant to learn in life
Is how to let go
Mark kenny Mar 2020
Summarizing how my day went wasn't part of the plan
But am a writer sharing part of my life is always part of the plan.

Discussing my plans for the day definitely has to end up till midnight
You really sure you up for the conversation up till midnight.

Am yawning now calling your attention to the time of the night
Your heavy breathing and your long breath making me realise you had a hell of a night.

But don't just give up it's almost time we end this conversation
At the end of the night we have to sit up and write a new conversation.
Post this anytime unless we reach the end of the night
AngelAutumn4 Jan 2020
It is that same optimistic pessimism. That ephemeral, translucent feeling..which gives me life and meaning. When taken to the extreme, the world becomes cold. Everything fades. Who I am ceases to be, and in my place, a force of absolute clarity emerges, in the realization that in the grand scheme, nothing matters.

I have witnessed this happen. I have watched myself die. Time and time again have I, sat back and wondered why it is that I cannot stop this sequence of events,
  from unfolding in front of me. When clarity strikes and I realize that the man I have been does not matter anymore, just as before,
I wonder,
Why?

I have talked to my fellow man on the subject. I have come to know their mannerisms, their discomforts, their quieted discussions hushed for fear that insanity looms, and I have grown to assume the worst of them..that in the end, most are blind to the truth of these deaths.

Subtle in nature and slow in their pace, these key moments race to define who we are by summarizing who we have been up to the point of contact with them. From that point of derision, a part of our life is forever etched in memory, wether we remember or not.

After a period of time, who we are can no longer be defined by any measure of who have been. We are a collection of key moments, fractures and schisms form the face for what we have become. In the end, a personality template, made whole by the mention of a few distant names, certain days are remembered forever, while others fade away into obscurity.

We are nothing but the deaths of who we once were, compounded from birth to keep us interesting.

— The End —