Warm Mug of Phantom Poetry N. J. Saroff

Poems from my job and living in the woods

That all of you want to come join the podcast and drink tea and read poetry with me reach out and dm me at n.j.saroff

This episodes talks about some topics such as homophobic gender dysphoria and suicide. Maybe skip about 13 minutes when i bring up those content warning. I have changed my name to Nichémat and have update my pronouns to they he. Going to try to make this podcast more monthly than weekly but maybe we'll get some extra episodes I'll also be publishing scripts of episodes upon requests as i don't have enough characters to print it in my description. If you'd like to make. Donation reach out to my insta n.j.saroff to keep this podcast going. Lots of warmth and love to all of you enjoy a cup of tea and some poetry with me

Welcome to episode 18 of njs warm mug of phantom poetry if you new the podcast I'm NJ Saroff a
Also known as the phantom poet on SoundCloud

This podcast best enjoyed a cup of tea and today's tea is


Today's poems are what someone would put on my tombstone, letters to your Shadow, where wind would take me and human
And the poem of the week is there is no greater crime than leaving by Bertolt brecht



What someone else would put on your tombstone

Here lies Natalie
my full name would be printed on my tombstone
I would not be able to make a correction or fix any of the gendered words used on to it
it would say she lies here or she lived a good life
She was a writer she was everything at the same time she was nothing she wanted to be she was a daughter, she was an actress, she was absolutely nothing
she she she
I was not a she when I died I want to be the he, the they,
I want people to respect the gender that I I found myself in
I want the name NJ printed on my stone I know that's a lot to ask for
I know that Natalie is the name they wanted
I know that Natalie has meaning
but I don't connect with Natalie it's like we're two different people in the room one is called NJ, the other called Natalie, NJ is demiboy or non-binary Natalie is girl we aren't friends we would walk by each other in the hallway and ignore the other
We do know that the other exists and that some people prefer one over the other
and that some wish that one would just go away and die
To die nameless to disappear and not bother any more to correct people on pronouns or names or the gender identity
How you say
daughter instead of child mother instead of parent gurl instead of pal sometimes I wish I was nameless formless non existent then they would have nothing to get wrong
But I exist so please just listen before you put me in the ground and move on




Letter to your shadow
Dear shadow
Shall I call you my dark twin
Surely you are not evil
You are simply a reflection
You take on my form, my outline
Magnify and shrink it
You desire the light though you aren't seen in the night
You are my longest and oldest friend
every time I've been alone not in darkness but in the light that shines you have found me and in a way almost held me
you do not speak
But maybe you do not need to
You do listen better than I do
I've always wondered what's it like on the other side for you
to always follow
to never go your own
to create their outline instead of your own
I wonder if you miss me the way I miss you when it is too dark or when I am under shade
I wonder if you think of me in those times when I am away
I wonder if you wait for the light
wait for the sun, smile at its arrival
or
if you don't want to be seen you want to hide if you want to remain invisible
dearest Shadow you are my oldest and longest friend
You have seen me through everything
You know all my secrets
I don't know if you wanted to
but you do
and now forever it will be just us two



I have vivid dreams my thoughts paint images of days and weeks that stretch on in 2 years my memories I fall asleep the colorful visions of old times I called myself an artist yet I seem to only produce my best work in my head never fully able to put it out on the paper with brush or pen a dream of my masterpiece the words flowing so quickly the brush not shaking in my hand I tremble at the thought of making something beautiful it's not that I don't think I'm beautiful I do think I'm beautiful but there's something mystical about art shape its words how do we humans feel worthy enough to make it why do we feel the need to capture all the moments around us
I call myself a writer I call myself an artist call myself a playwright I call myself a poet I call myself human and I think that's the only phrase that best describes me



Where I'd like the wind to take me
Back to the days of my youth
Back to when I was closeted
Back to when I claimed silence to be my one true friend
Back to dating simply so I could

Welcome to episode 17 of NJ warm mug of phantom poetry I'm NJ Saroff also known as the phantom poet on SoundCloud

This podcast is best enjoyed with a cup of tea and today's tea is


Today's poems are a poem for destructo, a poem to mousetrap, to Georgia and sunflowers by van Gogh and the poem of the week verses 1, 20, 21, and 51 from song of myself by Walt Whitman




To Georgia O'Keefe

Bathed in colors are the roaring flowers
springing to the curves of life
growing out of the page
blossoming into magnificent shapes,
paint droplets circling and bubbling around the edges
A flower, a forest,
It could be anything and everything
What do you find in the painting



Poem for mousetrap
I'm a glutton for food
Hearing my bowl get filled puts me in the mood
I love play
I lay on humans and make them stay give me attention all through the day
When I see a mouse I don't just pounce I stalk and wait till it's the perfect date to grab it up and eat it up
And say oh yum cause I'm a cat that likes to have fun
My fur is black like the night
I'm always ready to cheer my owners up just right
I jump onto there thighs when they want to cry and I purr till their filled with delight
I love to sit on laps
My name is mousetrap


Poem for sunflower Van Gogh
Van Gogh was not just a man of madness
His Happiest picture was maybe also his saddest
Sunflowers spark joy
Yet this painting seems coy
They sit in a vase drooping down
Missing the dirt missing the ground
Losing their petals
Waiting for the water to settle
Where did the sky go
The flowers do not know
They just hold their blooms
Filling the air with sweet perfumes

A poem to Destructo
In the box is where I'll stay
I do not want to come out and play
I want to lay in my box
Wait for lovely to pet me in the box
Sometimes I do like to climb
My fur is nice and fluffy
All the humans think it's so lovely
And lick my fur to unwind
If I see a mouse I get ready to pounce
I always miss but my owner still gives me a kiss
They love me even when telling me no
My name is Destructo

The final poem for this week is song of myself by Walt whitman
Walt Whitman was an American poet, essayist, and journalist. Bornin  May 1819, he was a humanist, who was a part of the transition between transcendentalism and realism, incorporating both views in his works. Whitman is among the most influential poets in the American canon, often called the father of free verse. He Died in March of 1892



Song of Myself (1892 version)

BY WALT WHITMAN

1, 20, 21,and 51

I celebrate myself, and sing myself,

And what I assume you shall assume,

For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.


I loafe and invite my soul,

I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.


My tongue, every atom of my blood, form’d from this soil, this air,

Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their parents the same,

I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,

Hoping to cease not till death.


Creeds and schools in abeyance,

Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten,

I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,

Nature without check with original energy

What I miss
I dreamed of you last night the way you used to be, the way you felt, the way you seemed, on the outside, never who you really were, on the inside, you are so much different in my dream, almost like, how you used to be, at the same, time better than who you ever were, I dreamed I could pick you apart, and then put the pieces back together, and we could start over, but we don't even talk anymore, we don't even see each other, I don't even know if you're alive or not, I hope you're okay, I hope you're good, but at the same time I wish I didn't care, I wish I didn't still think about you, I wished, that when we stopped conversations, that my life stopped having you in it, in my head, but it didn't, I didn't, I never stopped, I think what sucks is that the world keeps spinning, and I'm spinning in an entirely different direction than the earth, and I get dizzy easily, from all the thoughts clustering in my head, I don't know how to stop them, I obsess over them, you used to silence them, with the simplicity that was you, I think that's what I miss most, not you persay, but the silence you gave to me, the quiet, I know you weren't good for me, and I know I wasn't good for you, I know the two of us together were thid toxic Force, we just drove each other crazy, but I do miss you I know you don't care about I know you won't even see this, I know you don't miss me. But I still miss the idea of you and I don't know what to do
April 14



. For these next 2 poem the prompt I chose to do came from 2 separate final sentances the first comes from the April edition of poetry magazine the part The part that makes me want to close my ears and run away and buy unsettling me so profoundly convinces me of her Divinity her demand that I recognize in myself the humanity she sees and she summons us to see as her Offspring and her dwelling place as love is revealed

Love
There's a part that wants us to close our ears and run away run so far that we will not know how to return back,
We will forget who we are
We will forget where we came from
And we will never return and we think this is all well and good until we miss her until we miss the world until we miss all that came before us
all that once existed
And she in her beauty and divinity, in all her grace and pleasure
She will call to us
She'll so profoundly convince us to recognize ourselves and the humanity she sees so present in us.
She summons us to see, as her Offspring, and her dwelling place, the love slowly being revealed that we tried to hide away from. She will love, it is all she knows how to do,
she will love us even when we curse the name of love,
She will love us even when we cannot love ourselves, She will hold us when there is no one to hold us,
She the grace and beauty this invisible force
We do not see her
But she is there
And Sometimes we do not want her
But she is there from afar she is lonely
And she only craves to make us happy
To hurt or the harm was never Love's intension, Though we may believe it to be,
We want to close off
We want to run away we want to forget her beauty and her grace her pleasures that she gives to us
We want to see no more of her and forget ourselves
Love is in her dwelling place
She continues to call, continues to reach out, continues to wait
She has not given up on us
So we can not give up on love.


The Other quote is from Circe by Madeline miller the final sentance of that book was
I lift the brimming bowl to my lips and drink

Esteem
I lift the brimming bowl to my lips and drink,
I inhale with each sip.
I take every last drop in.
Then I lower the bowl and smile.
For so long I was afraid to even hold this bowl
To even look at it
Now it's in my hands
Now it's empty
I have done what I thought I'd never do.
I have taken a sip.
lt has felt wonderous, beautiful,
I breathe in
Finally,
A sigh of relief,
Of thanks,
I didn't think I was worthy of taking the sip
Of drinking in the whole bowl