The Wonder Boys

The Wonder Boys by Michael R. Burch (for Leslie Mellichamp, the late editor of The Lyric, who was a friend and mentor to many poets, and a fine poet in his own right) The stars were always there, too-bright cliches: scintillant truths the jaded world outgrew as baffled poets winged keyed kites?amazed, in dream of shocks that suddenly came true . . . but came almost as static?background noise, a song out of the cosmos no one hears, or cares to hear. The poets, starstruck boys, lay tuned in to their kite strings, saucer-eared. They thought to feel the lightning’s brilliant sparks electrify their nerves, their brains; the smoke of words poured from their overheated hearts. The kite string, knotted, made a nifty rope . . . You will not find them here; they blew away? in tumbling flight beyond nights’ stars. They clung by fingertips to satellites. They strayed too far to remain mortal. Elfin, young, their words are with us still. Devout and fey, they wink at us whenever skies are gray. The Singer by Michael R. Burch for Leslie Mellichamp The sun that swoons at dusk and seems a vanished grace breaks over distant shores as a child’s uplifted face takes up a song like yours. We listen, and embrace its warmth with dawning trust. Dawn, to the Singer by Michael R. Burch for Leslie Mellichamp “O singer, sing to me— I know the world’s awry— I know how piteously the hungry children cry.” We hear you even now— your voice is with us yet. Your song did not desert us, nor can our hearts forget. “But I bleed warm and near, And come another dawn The world will still be here When home and hearth are gone.” Although the world seems colder, your words will warm it yet. Lie untroubled, still its compass and guiding instrument.