Wassaic: The Poem

THURSDAY, JULY 21, 2005

Wassaic: The Poem

They say that only in movies
is there a parking spot just when you need one
But I wonder if there aren't people
who find spots at just the right time
As I walk off Metro North in Wassaic
and witness people strolling
right from the train to their ride in the lot
as if everythng always runs on time for them
while I slouch against the parking ticket box
watching until the last person enters their car

From Blue to Purple

From Blue to Purple

Sometimes you sigh
Have a good cry

Sometimes it's great
Fulfilling fate

Soar through what's hard
Straight to the stars

If my name were Emily
then one day you would find this
in a box beneath my bed
with hundreds others like it

You'd turn your head side to side
and cluck much like a chicken
I'd live on in history
along side the great Whitman

The quality would be superb
the voice one in a million
You'd say I just discovered
the new Emily Dickinson.

Thoughts Around A Class Reunion

Thoughts Around A Class Reunion

If I knew you
long ago
Inside a world
now faded
But the me
that I was
And the you
that you were
both
still
remember
Do I know you?

3 Poems

3 Poems

Inside

From a child
Stays the I

You now peek
Find unique

Still wrapped gifts
So many ifs

-----------------------------------

Shemah Al HaMitah

Take me for another night
Return me for a new day
Carry my soul again away
Fill me again with Your Light

-------------------------------------

Dual Life

Cavernous world
Fills my dreams at night
The memories
Take me through each day

- Rabbi Neil Fleischmann
July 2005

It's G-d's World

From June 2005

It's G-d's World

Sometimes the sky is gray
It just turns that way
You would prefer blue
But you can't even control you
Like the way you felt
As that candle melted
Your mood in sudden rain
Wax and wane, wax and wane

You can make a child smile
You can make a child cry
The smile is a seed
One day it grows
Into fields of confidence
happiness, kindness
The seeds of tears
Grow into the ugliest
Thorniest weeds you've ever seen -
Be Careful

(Written at the end of my first year of full time teaching)

Make (Me) Believe

Make (Me) Believe

A hundred
thousand
years ago
in a land
far away
before time
you’d fill
my days
and nights

Mr. Stone
and Quigley
I miss you
in my baths
and pictures
on the wall
where are you

Imagined friends
can’t disappear
till someone
says goodbye
so I wonder
where are mine
so hard to find

Someone just emailed me that she doesn't like the new pope's face and I imagined her seeing
endless footage of his image on TV and wrote this:

THURSDAY, APRIL 21, 2005

Poor Me With No TV

never seen a scud missile,
never seen the towers fall,
never seen smoke come out the vatican,
never seen much at all

read about it in papers
seen photos of it too
heard it on non-stop radio
but I'm worlds away from you

because you dodge missiles with CNN
watched the planes hit one hundred times
studied every wrinkle in the new pope's face
your life's richer than mine

I Wonder
( Fall 1991 )

I live in the past and the future
"Now" is just a watchtower
Having never lived in the present
And doubting I ever will
I wonder what it's like

(and as I see you
living this moment
I wonder how it feels)

Late At Night
By Neil Fleischmann

Late at night my thoughts run wild -
Start thinking, feeling, as a child
I realize that it's all a game,
Life goes on but we stay the same
Does anyone ever really change
Decide that it's time to rearrange
Their thoughts, their feelings, who they are
Or for humans are these things too far
off in the distance to ever reach
Are these the things one just can't teach?
It's late at night, it's time for bed
The thoughts run wild inside my head
Perhaps one day these thoughts will thrive
if I'm not working 9 to 5.

Techeilet

Blue
reminds me of
sea
reminds me of
sky
reminds me of
G-d

Flatbush
reminds me of
her
reminds me of
you
reminds me of
love

G-d Almighty, I miss him so much. I hope that I can offer a little bit to others of what he gave me. It's 8:30 now on a Sunday morning, Aaron's time.

Aaron

Sunday morning
Has become Aaron's time
To visit me
Since he died
"Oh, I've always been overweight" -
Matter of fact, charming, real
The way he did everything
I don't remember what day that was
That he made that comment
About being fat
There were so many comments
There were so many days
I'd say all too few
But he wouldn't like that
“What do I have left to live for
My life has been so complete”
We found it weird to hear that
Aaron could sound a bit weird
This was just a bit more
Suffering from mono
Losing so much weight
Body weight, life weight
Dangerously thin he was
And he knew it, it seems
We didn't
So we grimaced
And mocked
Lovingly
As he spoke
About being kept alive
By late night radio
And cigarettes
It seems like a joke
A joke he would've loved
That no-one else got
His kind of joke
“Don't you get it - see
I'm dead”
Aaron stop it
“Oh come on Shelley
I'm dead, I'm dead
I think that's great”

And my mind floats
Over thirteen years
My friend keeps talking
Like he always did
“Who's choice was it”
He asked me
When he barely knew me
And I lost my first job
And years later I told him
And he said just what I needed
Only “I'm sorry”
“This girl is ready
To spin nickels for you”
He told me, implored me
Citing Rebetzin Jungreis
In her Jewish Press column
Saying singles over 30
Need a push
So he pushed me
But never pushed me away
And never went away
He's come closer for me
On Sundays like this one
While the world oversleeps
Aaron blows through
My air conditioner vent
I smell his smoke
I hear him shout
I feel my pain
And he tells me it's OK
“You don't get it
Being dead is good for me
I didn't expect to like it
Who does?

The Painless Poem

Growth
Closeness
Such things
I want.

If less
was all
I wanted
then what?

I'd feel
less pain
more comfort
less real.

Mime Is Money

Conventional and quiet
Quickly I sent you away
To run to pretty quirky
To let her have her say
Let her take my money
Let her take my time
Let her send me away
Like a helpless mime

From TUESDAY, JANUARY 11, 2005

Beis Medrash Poem

If an abhorrent spirit
connects with you
drag him to
the study hall,
said the sages.
They didn't say study
they just said go.
So, here I am
- brought him along.

You

(written 20 plus years ago)

You move
too quickly
Please stop
let me breathe
You lie
as you cheat me
Take your time
as you please
So I pause
and think
but nothing waits
And in time
I grow old
while still planning
my youth

My Queen

I'm always rushing to you
at the same time I run away
Last minute I embrace you
time, time again
Minor infractions I've waged
but I never broke you
never broke away
Sunsets; ours, when I find you
and sunsets foreshadow our departure
We can't be together all the time...
...we can't be together all the time
yet I pray we always meet, part
I pity those who've never had you
You; sweetness, you; grace
No-one holds me for a minute
the way you hold me the whole day
No possession can match
the holiness of our time
I hurry now
Like thousands of other rushes
pray that I arrive to embrace you
In good time.

The Super Ego In The Back Seat

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 30, 2004

Dear Paper and Pen,
Please tell me
as the driver and I agree
that I am now late;
are images needed
for poetry to be?
Is highway traffic
the problem
or am I held up
by blockages in me?
Will the accident
victim be alright?
Does it only matter
that now I’m moving?
What about loss of life
through the Tsunami -
do I feel such tragedy?
Dear Diary, driver says
we’re almost there
Gotta go, more later, maybe
Yours – Neil 

A Sunday of Yeshiva HS Parent Teacher Conferences

MONDAY, DECEMBER 20, 2004

There is nothing
Less apt right now
Than writing a poem.

I’m a grown up
Surrounded by more
Teachers like me
Counting down to
The end of a long
Long day of meetings
Where we tell parents
Who their children are
Until six hours later
The minions dwindle
And we huddle and conspire
Drinking Snapple and
Reading The Week In Review
Complaining too loudly into cells.

So I would never betray my peers
And sit quietly writing poetry
As I take in the humanity
Of the forty seven humans I met eyes with today.

Concrete Poem

December 7, 2004

After the still small voice
a noise
And after the noise,
a still small voice.
And after it, a noise.
And after it, a still small voice
And after the still small voice,
a noise.
Discard the rest.

-Yehuda Amichai
The day before Chanukah
in a breath between classes
I seek refuge in the library
and find fragments of Amichai
spread throughout the New Republic

The bell rings and I run to class
still holding the magazine
as I referee kids to seats
take attendance, open a bible
Today's lesson: Jewish Kings

I hear only Amichai
a small still voice
louder than mine, around the room
Quietly, I ask a girl to copy him down
in this diary, to keep

- Neil Fleischmann

Saturday Night: Eleven Forty-Five PM

SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 21, 2004

Self absorbed Vin Scelsa keeps talking,
I tread the net and stop at Mimaamakim
"Idiot’s Delight" almost done I’ll need
distraction other than WFUV, because
"Group Harmony Review" isn’t my thing.
So I visit this old friend of a poetry site
while Elton says he hopes I don’t mind
and I write like a Billy Collins wannabe.
Filled from contentment of Shabbos rest,
I am disappointed my latest isn’t posted.
And Alejandro Escovedo sings of hands
as I notice eight mortgage ads posted in
spaces that should have held my poetry,
as Vin riffs of TV and the random FCC
and I prepare to post/publish these words,
my way of calling G-d out of my depths.

Alone In A Nice Restaraunt

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 22, 2004

Sometimes I imagine myself a child
seeing videos of me now.
And this is one of the scenes
that I wouldn't believe.

I stop doing what never works.
Trying to relax,
put down the pen and breathe
and breathe and breathe and breathe.