SOMEDAY I’LL LOVE N.M. LEEPSA
By © N.M. Leepsa, 2018
After Frank O’Hara /Roger Reeves/Ocean Vuong/ Haley Mitchell
Category: Spoken Word Poetry
Leepsa, you can reach the sky,
And shine like a star,
The path looks long, but it’s not too far.
Do believe. Your willpower is your ticket to reach your destination.
The train has already left.
Each station brings new experiences, not the crowd of hurdles.
In Winter
The darkness takes over
Some mornings I wake up in the black
fetal under 3 layers, swaddled
until I uncover an arm or a leg
I’m hit with a stinging chill and remember that it is Winter
My dreams are different during shorter days
In them, my teeth fall out
or the house burns down
my plane leaves the airport because I went to the wrong gate
my party invitations get lost in the mail
My uncertainty is highlighted
these stories, little dramas
magnified
so I will study them
It's time to take your medicine
I thought I heard inside my dream
The bars of steel are nothing
Not as strong as they might seem
You can climb that distant mountain
Stand inside the mist
Hand your prayers to Angels
Every prayer that's on your list
Perhaps love does really exist, but the beings we are surrounded by don't know how
Perhaps there is no such thing as soulmates, but if you're blessed with loving someone who respects you back, you should stick with 'em
Perhaps the tides come in and then receed to show us what, if anything, will be left behind after some turbulence
Perhaps we shouldn't compare struggles, feet can manage socks and hands can manage mittens
Perhaps love does really exist, but the beings we are surrounded by don't know how
Perhaps there is no such thing as soulmates, but if you're blessed with loving someone who respects you back, you should stick with 'em
Perhaps the tides come in and then receed to show us what, if anything, will be left behind after some turbulence
Perhaps we shouldn't compare struggles, feet can manage socks and hands can manage mittens
If you want to milk the Earth as a cow,
Then nourish the soil with seed and plow;
For when it’s set with deep grown roots,
Like a plentiful tree, it will yield many fruits.
Inspired by a Sanskrit poem by Bhartri-Hari, as translated in the Clay Sanskrit Library edition:
Rajan, dudhuksasi yadi Ksiti dhenum enam,
Ten’ adya vatsam iva lokam amum pusana;
Tasmims ca samyag anisam paripusyamane
Nana phalam phalati kalpa lat eva Bhumih.
King, if you want to milk this Earth as a cow,
The River Chu has split the hills in two
To send the jade-brushed water east and back,
Around the two opposing hills anew
As a lonely boat sits still in a sunlit crack.
Original Chinese poem by Li Bai
Nothing is so dear, a noble warrior said,
Than glory bought by armor pierced in blood
Amid the cries of those who’ve fallen in mud—
For what is life if honor’s been left for dead?
Emaciated, poor, or stuck without life’s luck,
It’s to the bold and daring that the world goes;
Whether in women, war, or what ambition sows,
With courage alone we come up from the muck.
Some say the day-maker rises with the sun
As the lord of night shines down from the moon:
For all that’s fire, a life without water is none,
United in time and space
Existing in nothing
But the never-ending grace
Of consciousness’ string
When seen from inside the place
A tranquil life can bring.
I’ll follow him thus!
After the Sanskrit of Bhartri Hari
A fern surrounds my life like a hollow maze
In the intricate lattice of love’s first gaze;
Following a pattern that guides me on this road
I reach for her lips beneath the mistletoe.
My love comes forth with the apple of desire,
A tangled taste that takes a life to acquire;
Magic and nightshade in a mandrake stew,
I drink the nighttime herbs in a witch’s brew.
Seared in my skin like a tattoo of her name,
My cry has faded to a touch without shame;
Pulled by a thread that stains the earth and sky
