Poetry by Matthew Lippman

     Timo Newton-Syms CC




THE SORROW OF THE WHOLE DAMN FUCKING STUPID WORLD

….grief sneaks up and smacks you while you are buying eggs because the Key Food loudspeaker is playing Roy Orbison's Crying and you never cried at your Bubbie's funeral, but you are sobbing into the dairy case. – Marisa Schwartz

It’s important that you let grief sneak up on you. 
And when it does, it’s important to let it do its magic on your body. 
It does not matter if you are in the dairy aisle 
or the concentration camp 
or inside the music of Philip Glass 
like Koyaanisqatsi. 
What does that mean even? 
Oh yes, life out of balance.
I saw that film once
and then I listened to Einstein on the Beach and wept my face off. 
The point is when you weep your face off 
you have to remember that it does not matter where you are. 
It’s always good to do it on the street corner 
or in the crowded bus or the music festival 
where early 90s Pearl Jam is the opening act. 
Because it’s always a surprise 
and the surprise is an act of generosity. 
The body giving itself something and 
so when the grief comes at you in your Brooklyn apartment 
with Jeff in the kitchen scrambling eggs
and Levi in Chicago making magic with the wind 
you have to let it give you something. 
You know why Philip Glass called Einstein on the Beach Einstein on the Beach? 
Because it’s all water and water gives us something
that is the intersection between the sensual and the cerebral. 
Einstein’s mind,
the salty beach. 
Water carries us somewhere 
whether we know about relativity and the time/space continuum
or it’s just Sunday morning clipping coupons watching The Peanuts with the kids 
and there you are at the little Formica table 
and you don’t even know why 
but here it comes 
and it comes 
and it’s your personal sorrow 
and then it’s the sorrow of the whole damn fucking stupid beautiful world. 
I say: let it flatten you in the dairy aisle. 
You are good at that, the flattening, 
the letting it flatten you 
because you wrote me to say, 
I can cry at all the nostalgia big expected shatter 
your heart and crack your soul moments, holding babies, 
shoveling dirt into a grave, 
looking at old photos that remind me how sad it is to live dwelling in regret -  
but most often, I don't.
But even when you are not in the dairy aisle, 
your weeping is a blueness into greenness coming full circle into a daily
silent cry. 
Sometimes when we don’t cry 
it’s always in the room, a chair, 
just sitting in the corner being a chair, 
a chair in balance which is why you have to go sit in it 
to give the life out of balance 
some balance. 
This is why it’s important to let the grief hold your hand 
in the workplace bathroom 
or the cab of a crane operator 
or inside sex 
when you are having sex 
and you have to come out the other side of having sex
into a nakedness unborn.
This how we try and get life into some kind of temporary equilibrium.
We let the grief slam us up against the glass doors in the dairy aisle 
in our unborn nakedness 
so we can be together in front of everyone
being together. 




​
LONG SHOT LOVERS ON SCREEN
The rom-com cry is the best cry. – Jolene Grgas

Last night I saw a movie. Long Shot. 
Charlize Theron and Seth Rogan 
are bad asses. 
He’s a journalist who gets fucked up on beer and Molly 
and weed and whatever 
else the sky gives a person to get fucked up on. 
She’s the Secretary of State of The United States of America. 
They fall in love.
They’re not supposed to fall in love. The optics look bad. 
Isn’t that the problem with people? Optics. 
Like crying.
I watched Long Shot last night in my bed and cried forever. 
The rom-com cry that is half meadow of yellow wildflowers,
half Brooklyn Navy Yard.
I was alone in the ocean of my bed 
with all the whales, sting rays, and fat politicians of commerce. 
So, I cried.
The rom-com cry. 
The sentimental cry of a wolf ready to tear apart an elk 
just the way Charlize says, I love you, 
and Seth says, I have loved you since I was 12. 
That really got me in my half-grown guts. 
It doesn’t matter what the movie is about.
It’s all so stupid and I was alone in bed with my feelings
I couldn’t stop crying the rom-com cry. 
Why do we cry the rom-com cry? 
Nothing is real and everything is pretty, that’s why. 
Because we cry when our hearts are broken and we don’t know why they are broken. 
Because dumb movies are the only way to let our bodies know that we can go backwards
in our sadness 
to find our sadness. 
So, when stupid Seth Rogan and blonde eyed Charlize Theron 
play long shot lovers on screen 
it turns me inside out 
because maybe all I ever wanted to be 
was nothing
and here I am, 
nothing, 
and it feels good.
Maybe my love can only go so far as rom-com love 
and then I have no idea. 
Because life is so hard and love is not that hard,
it is just love: 
all fireworks, fuck-yous, make up sex, and sunsets.
This morning when I woke after crying for 3 hours at the ridiculous movie scenes and dialogue 
I felt the approaching genderless energy of death
that had everything do with the rom-com of Charlize and Seth called Long Shot. 
When they kissed in the movie it looked so real 
it was real.
Earlier in the night I thought I was going to watch Citizen Kane
but it wasn’t stupid enough.
That’s what I love about feelings, how stupid they are,
and that you can cry forever 
the way stars do 
even though they’ve never seen a movie about the attraction of opposites.
Long Shot is my favorite movie 
because crying forever, no matter the reason, 
is making friends with the approaching genderless nature of death
and this is how you love yourself into nothingness. 



​

​Matthew Lippman is the author of six poetry collections. His latest collection, We Are All Sleeping With Our Sneakers On (2024), is published by Four Way Books. His previous collection Mesmerizingly Sadly Beautiful (2020) is published by Four Way Books. It was the recipient of the 2018 Levis Prize.