Best Neglect Poems

Neglect
by Michael R. Burch

What good are your tears?
They will not spare the dying their anguish.
What good is your concern
to a child sick of living, waiting to perish?

What good, the warm benevolence of tears
without action?
What help, the eloquence of prayers,
or a pleasant benediction?

Before this day is...

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"The worst feeling is to be ignored once, then twice, 
then again and again by someone you consider precious."
                          ...

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resisting change
has not
done me
any favors
losing track
how times evolve

perpetually convinced 
that my priorities
line up
yet neglecting
to reevaluate

my brain kept in a fog 
I’m quite delusional
reluctant to question
my ways of being askew



AP: Honorable Mention 2020

posted on November 23, 2018...

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“A wound gets worse when it’s treated with neglect.” – Stevie Nicks

My heart aches,
like the sun aches for the moon,
but stalling became my shackle, 
knowing an evolution was never
on the horizon;
wandering stark habitats—
paradoxically, a devoted outcast
tangled in neglect;
I lay isolated soothing my soul,
mending the wounds...

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Dearest Sons
and dearest Cinderella StepSister,
I regret ways I have failed each of you.

From today's view of memory clips,
frames as farms of teaching-learning times,
my Great Lover Eldest, yet perpetually unfulfilled,
AfricanAmerican urban male Thug,
driver of van repurposing other's grateful loss,
transporting toward highest and best
ecologically healthy use.

You needed...

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Through the generations long before we're born
Hearing from our ancestors through unspoken form
Enters the human being supposedly once in love 
Sins laid out on scrolls from the Heaven's above?
In as much as mankind must believe through faith
Nothing that is said guarantees we go unscathed
Oh how...

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There's weeds in my
garden I can't use a
ho(e)
The man who could
pull them don't care
no mo

The ****'s overgrown
I might need a plow
But it's waited so
long that it's no
use now

When we planted the
thing we both shared
the work
Then one day I
looked up and said,
"Where is that
jerk?"

My back started
aching,...

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Our aged among us need love, care and compassion
Not someone callous, lashing out at them with hostility
Someday you too will be so frail and weak
Is that the way you want your last days to be?

Consider yourself lucky to pass on at an early age
For you...

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When I was 4 1/2 years old, 
as abrupt as a spanking, 
my once reliable mother brought home 
a hospital surprise 
with an alien face and 
a blood-darkened eerie belly clip 
that was to suddenly fall off one day. 
Soon I became 
much uglier than...

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Time never wasted
                              Envious of you sitting in this basement
      ...

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I tremble before you, my vying emotion
I thought I could be loved with complying emotion

My mirror used to love my sight
there is no more of that undying emotion

Neglect tore at me, scattering me into shards
This whole life of mine is fragmented by self-denying emotion

Love is...

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He sat in his recliner in the balcony, 
the evening soft breeze so cool, tender
with his eyes closed as if in a trance;
The light breeze swept along his wrinkled skin
caressing everything it touched on its way
at the tiny square balcony garden -
the blooms, leaves, herbs
and...

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To you I'm just an afterthought
Endearing name that you forgot
A half remembered romance plot
A once frequented sacred spot

To you I'm just an alibi
Some one to cover up the lie,
for when you're with your ride or die
The hush of do not question why

To you I'm just...

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What Good Are Our Tears?
by Michael R. Burch

What good are our tears?
They will not spare the dying their anguish.
What good is our concern
to a child sick of living, waiting to perish?

What good, the warm benevolence of tears
without action?
What help, the eloquence of prayers,
or a pleasant...

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Blackberries start as white dots in a sea of thorns
The flower will fade, and a green berry will join
Protected, it will grow and be pink
Safe from even a massacring mink
Larger, it will swell until it is red
No enemy can lay down their head
Darker and darker...

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