Long Irish Poems

Dad hit me only once, an upper cut to the solar plexus. It nearly lifted me off my feet. I was 17 then and already fairly tall, 6’1.” He was 48 and of medium height,...

Read More

It may have been the devil himself who prompted the kids in my schoolyard back in 1947 to chant "Patsy Foley's roly-poly from eating too much ravioli."

At first, no one could remember who started the...

Read More

Instruction
by Michael R. Burch

Toss this poem aside
to the filigreed and the wild tide
of sunset.

Strike my name,
and still it is all the same.
The onset

of night is in the despairing skies;
each hut shuts its bright bewildered eyes.
The...

Read More

Erin, for a girl who embodies Ireland
by Michael R. Burch

All that’s left of Ireland is her hair—
bright carrot—and her milkmaid-pallid skin,
her brilliant air of cavalier despair,
her train of children—some conceived in sin,
the others to avoid...

Read More

Medieval Poems



Wulf and Eadwacer
(Old English circa 990 AD)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

My people pursue him like crippled prey.
They'll rip him apart if he approaches their pack.
We are so different!

Wulf's on one island; I'm on...

Read More

I Have Labored Sore
anonymous medieval lyric (circa the fifteenth century)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I have labored sore / and suffered death, 
so now I rest / and catch my breath.
But I shall come /...

Read More

The Song of Amergin: Modern English Translations

The Song of Amergin
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I am the sea breeze
I am the ocean wave
I am the surf's thunder
I am the stag of the seven tines
I am...

Read More

Thanksgiving, 1971,
a parachute pilgrim approaches Northwest Flight 305
as Dan Cooper, anonymous businessman,  anarchist airborne, 
black suit, black sunglasses, a black tie
and a black briefcase broaching black motives,
Portland to Seattle, prison or criminal pantheon, 
before...

Read More

The Picture of Dorian Gray: Paint Me As An Event
The Picture of Dorian Gray, a decent fanciful novel by Irish writer Oscar Wilde, published in 1890. The novel, the only one written by Wilde, had...

Read More

I remember my cherished Wolf Cub pack, 
How I loved those Wednesday evenings, 
The games, the pomp and seriousness of the camps, 
The different coloured scarves, sweaters and hair 
During the mass meetings, 
The solemnity...

Read More

Setting aside richly incorporated through homeless economies,
we have three political ways
to compare a population's internal status:
a. Aboriginal populations,
b. Immigrants--sometimes appearing as multiculturing creolic waves,
c. EmPowered Natives.

Natives are aboriginals
unless a more self-centered wave of supremacist immigrants
stake...

Read More

The Pictish Faeries
by Michael R. Burch

Smaller and darker
than their closest kin,
the faeries learned only too well
never to dwell
close to the villages of larger men. 

Only to dance in the starlight
when the moon was full
and men...

Read More

The Spaniel

A Spaniel that uses its head 
Can tell when its owner’s unfed 
So instead of a duck
That is down on its luck 
Will deliver a pizza instead
 
The Afghan Hound

The Afghan’s a dog groomer’s...

Read More

Two new crutches and two double shots of Bushmills Irish Whiskey enabled Joe Faherty to move from the back seat of Moira Murphy's 1976 Buick into Eagan's Funeral Home for Tim McGillicuddy's wake. At 87,...

Read More

Thirty years ago, long before ISIS started executing Kurds, Muslims and Christians, I hired a Pakistani Muslim as an art director in Chicago. I was an Irish Catholic editor putting out a small national magazine....

Read More

“Women Have Loved Before As I Love Now”
by Edna St. Vincent Millay

Women have loved before as I love now;
At least, in lively chronicles of the past-
Of Irish waters by a Cornish prow
Or Trojan waters by...

Read More

Paddy didn't want to go to his wife's family reunion. He told her that in the same nice way he had told her in years past so as to avoid other reunions over the many...

Read More

Diaspora Dwellings

On my way into our sanctuary
this past Sunday morning
a woman I had met in choir
was strangely inclined
to share her family history.

Her dad came over from Ireland
because he wanted better business opportunities
for his healthy future.

Here...

Read More

I’m not saying my father hated the English, God forbid. If he were still alive, he’d hate to hear me say that. He’d correct me right away and say he didn’t hate the English. Truth...

Read More

*Image of Many Meanings by KWC.

Likeness ssenekiL: Part 2

(HOMONYMS: Homophones & Homographs)

The batter's foul ball killed a fowl that later caused a foul odor.
After painting the room red, he then redd it up and read...

Read More

In 1962, I was a caseworker, not a social worker, in the Cabrini-Green Housing Project in Chicago. In that era, the difference between a caseworker and a social worker was simple. A social worker had...

Read More

Like the twelfth
juror in the play
I must say I am not
convinced
For I know a recipe
for trouble 
I have seen the
double standards
And I do not approve
this for Kenya
I will never approve
it, and neither
Would you, dear
friend of...

Read More

Won’t you please take me back
To the brown couch at my Gramma’s house 
With the big gold-framed antique mirror over it
And hand me Grampa’s old transistor radio
Covered in leather with glorious knobs
That brought me the...

Read More

Out with his boys drinking, feeling rowdy
Special occasion
Rolling the way they do
His lover is not with them
She stayed in for the night
He misses her company
But enjoys his time with the guys
He'll swing by later

A local...

Read More

Jim Daley and Joe McCarthy had something in common. They died at 80 going to the bathroom in the middle of the night. Walt O'Brien, their protege, found this out when he called the homes...

Read More