Long Amorous Poems

Epigrams by Michael R. Burch



Negligibles
by Michael R. Burch
 
Show me your most intimate items of apparel:
begin with the hem of your quicksilver slip ...



Negotiables
by Michael R. Burch

Love should be more than the sum of its...

Read More

Doggerel II: Doggerel about Doggerel, or, More Nonsense Verse

The Board
by Michael R. Burch

Accessible rhyme is never good.
The penalty is understood:
soft titters from dark board rooms where
the businessmen paste on their hair
and, Walter Mitties, woo the...

Read More

Salve
by Michael R. Burch

for the victims and survivors of 9-11

The world is unsalvageable ...
but as we lie here
in bed
stricken to the heart by love
despite war’s
flickering images,

sometimes we still touch,

laughing, amazed,
that our flesh
does not despair
of love
as...

Read More

Dream-worker 
delves deeply into my dream;

vibrations fondle anticipation
foreplay wakes wide-eyed 
swells of liquid libido quake the rendezvous edge -
a primordial being in his prime
a masculine ego quest for affaire d’amour;
her night-loving body 
c h a...

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

Attitude with latitude

originally written January 19th, 2019
and tension defines the dynamic

Valiant prince sip pulled effort
rebuffed, snubbed, thumbed
courtesy eldest daughter
uncontested vainglorious woke
mine genuine apology,
viz sincerely yours truly
psyche asper paternal overture
toward aforementioned offspring
smitten with opprobrium
figuratively smacked upside...

Read More

In the intimate interlace of free will and fate, in the ultimate interplay of time and place, and with the consummate checkmate of my human dignity, all that is.. is over in the stormy, swarming...

Read More

(One poet's vision of what being indwelled by Christ's heart might look like)        

What makes me feel loved isn't easy to say, 
And not because the heart of...

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

My dreams were of the dire Queen
I had allowed her reign over me, callousing my heart,
She was inside me, laughing
Having crawled in
My walls closing, as she filled my soul
We were one, yes for a time,...

Read More

Thiru-Valluvar on Praising the Good Qualiities of Ladies: Canto 112 - Nalam Pinainththu Uraiththal

[The poet devotes the third part of his treatise, the Thiruk-Kural to INBATHTHUPPAAL, the amorous relationship between the sexes, i.e.,  cantos...

Read More

Temporal incarnation of Aphrodite...

induces idyllic reverie
delight evoking similar surge,
when skirting, and eluding 
fidelity defining the marital law
on par with courting in flagrante delicto.

After reading about 
Greek goddess of love
fancy notion woke whereof
warmth suffused me
snug as...

Read More

Ledger of Love

In the shadows of the Victorian night,
Where candles flicker with amorous light,
A forbidden love fiercely burns,
In a pounding heart, passion yearns.

Amidst the lace and satin array,
Where masks conceal bygone dismay,
A dance of desire,...

Read More

My friends have always hated Valentine's Day.
They ridiculed the pimply-faced boys
Whose hormone-infused offerings
Smell of Axe cologne and sweaty palms.

Greater the mocking of pubescent princesses
Who prance and twirl and collect tokens
From admirers like shells on a...

Read More

Walking past each other and just by chance
My heart skips a beat and my knees turn weak
Your eyes lock with mine in a fleeting glance
In a ricochet of emotion I just cannot speak 

Our time...

Read More

Whar art thou dame of my dream?

Eagerness readily overtakes me prior 
to succumbing to nightly slumber. 

Tis boot a blink when eyelids become relaxed 
adrift abed invariably occurs counting backwards  
from one hundred –...

Read More

The Anatomy of a Kural: Maxim Number 245 (taken at random) of the Thirukkural, the Tamil Classic on Ethics by Thiruvalluvar 

allal arulaalvaarkku illai valivalangum

mallalmaa naalam kari (K245)

“The teeming earth's vast realm, round which the...

Read More

War leaves scars. They are emotional. They are physical. They are spiritual.

My brother had proposed to my sister-in-law on Valentine's Day, and so it was on that fateful day, 12 years later that his and...

Read More

So having  conversations
 Let us fly away like an eagle to our soul mate's space the throne room the habitation in the flesh-  the soul, the spirit- the mind- the song the joy...

Read More

O beloved chevalier, 
cloaked in shimmering champagne armor,
tonight I long to feel your sultry skin,
embroidered with emerald embellishments 
and twinkling teal topaz, 
tailored to tempt,
veiling these tanned desires.

My soul sways to a chained string 
of...

Read More

"Their World"

Of course, there was no re-assurance from them that they would respond to the message I had sent. Morning had arrived. 

The day had commenced as any other, unravelling out of bed, in itself...

Read More

When Nature's Beauty and Sky's Heart Became One
 
Emerald glen, I first saw angel’s wings come down
one of Nature's bright treasures outside our small town;
as brilliant glows entered sad heart and seeing eyes,
I heard voices...

Read More

The Midnight Visitor. 

(A lone voice whispers)

I stood over her luscious form
Bathed by the cool glare of the Crying moon as 

The Ancient Mother pretended to sleep but watched as she slept

Listened to her slow...

Read More

Circa sixty one years ago July 6th, 2001 -
birth of dear beloved wife

We now get along swimmingly
analogous to this bro and his older sis
on the cusp of our gifted silver married years
if her presence absent,...

Read More

Like the breathless air of twilight,
As the moon softly rises and tempts the stars
Into the quiet revelations, admissions
Grace, splendor, magnificence…
Painting the dreams with a quivering ink,
Spilled upon the emptiness beneath the still, white page,
Simplicity at...

Read More