Long Battalions Poems

Postcard 1
by Miklós Radnóti
written August 30, 1944
translated by Michael R. Burch
 
Out of Bulgaria, the great wild roar of the artillery thunders,
resounds on the mountain ridges, rebounds, then ebbs into silence
while here men, beasts, wagons...

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Yet at this very moment the cathedral was crumbling
down upon the cries of foresaken refugees, 
the monastery's walls wobbling from war's wreckage, 
and as the black bursts billowed into sun drenched brutality
with the bodies of...

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Resistance On The Iberian Peninsula

“Liberté, égalité, fraternité (Liberty, Equality, Fraternity),”
Scream French revolutionists as they guillotine monarchists heads, 1
Then crown Napoleon Bonaparte Emperor of France, 2
Who commands the French forces in wars raged across Europe.

The Grande...

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“The Blue Nazarene” 

caeruleum caelum 
in nubibus
caeruleum

caeruleum caelum
in nubibus 
de hyacintho nazarene

testimonium:

white stallions, 

clouds commanding
Christus imperium
above all below 

all below 
now present to worship 
a secular ghost

stopped dead in their tracks
those ridiculous battalions
games of war...

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In The Valley Of Avalon

This day the master of my Fate
Is none of those who lead shuddering
Through mazes of wizardry,-
Nor Trachmyr the Hunstman,
Nor Tannwein the daughter of Gweir,
Nor Penpingyon the porter of the palace,
Nor the...

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 La Fête foraine de Scarborough (La Version complète)
 
      For the medieval English poet and Simon and Garfunkel 
-	In admiration -

Allez-vous à Scarborough fête foraine ?
(Sur la côte d'une...

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Let murderers subdue the guilt within
let not such burdens weigh upon your heart,
for bound by oath, your troopers are akin
to brothers that share equally in part.
‘Tis fiendish pride that fills your evil corps
of blackened angels,...

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The emptiness is left with no resolve
for all the stars in Heaven have maligned.
Your God has let morality devolve
into the darkest days of humankind.
A war to end all wars has spawned revenge,
the madness seeks to...

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I've always admired 
horses
and I guess I most surely 
always will
No legend without em' 
complete
The unsung heroes of 
any heroic battle

Pony, colt, filly or mare
ride it bareback if you 
dare

Ride them to a trot, ride...

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(1A.)
Doomed To Feel That Bite And Hear Serpent's Wicked Hiss

Beyond mingling of Light, Matter, Human thought
reams of coils within darkest abyss are there caught
denied rays emitted by our reddish flame sun
wherein single feather may weigh...

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Arthur Rimbaud Translations of Antico (“Ancient” or “Antique”), Rêvé Pour l'hiver (“Winter Dream”), and Dawn



Antico (“Ancient” or “Antique”)
by Arthur Rimbaud
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Graceful son of Pan! Around your brow, crowned with flowers and...

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Historically accurate, narrative poem

25 June, 1876 - Valley of the Little Bighorn

Nothing stirs this June night, not a summer’s breeze or a breath of life.  All is eerily quiet, and on yonder hillside, shroud...

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“It Came in Our Dreams”

The Others 
watch on,
somewhere above us.

we, ant like
form our battalions
soldier ants 
with no substantial sting
repelling reptilian 
brains in flight
striking our oily deals 
sliding into our nightmares, 
acrid smoke, bee-keeping our hives
we...

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Kokoda Efogi  1942....
The Japanese turned tail and headed north on twenty eighth September forty two. ...
They'd struggled round on mountains fought stopped near Moresby by the few. ...
Eighteen hundred went to stop ten thousand...

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New Guinea Kokoda Campaign

In 1942 the Japs appeared, took all the islands north.
Our troops were mainly school boys and for New Guinea bound.
13,000 Japs landed, climbed up Kokoda and came forth.
As  Yanks,  Macarthur's...

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ANZAC Day 25/4/ 2024

This is a true story dedicated to the missing and the families of the missing of soldiers from the wars Australia has been involved in.

A Mother’s Love

Perhaps it was the machine-gun’s infernal...

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Mute
but immutable.
Unmoving, unmoveable;
timeless, yet tireless.
Solitary stalwart sentinel
surveils undulating horizon.

Aberrant, achromatic clouds
pock-mark the skies, as distant
rumblings herald his adversary's
latest gambit in their age-old conflict.

The wrath of a thousand crashing,
clashing, thrashing fists batter
against the beleaguered sentry.
Ceaselessly, remorselessly,
the...

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Fast as an atomic banshee, he roils sacred halls 
of White House clutches levers with brass balls
American powers remain unrestrained when he calls
Armada to exorcise imagine aery dragons, 
   he inarticulately falls
non-communicative, faux...

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Stone elongated nearly 4 thousand miles,
across the country of china, smiles.
The 16th century would see many small,
fortifications become a great wall.
The long wall's surface area is massive,
thus far, nothing man made has surpassed it.
Born of...

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How has it dawn on us so soon when we hadn’t even achieved much?
Why has the marketplace ceased to buy and sell so scanty the streets wither away
The clouds becomes more darkened as smokes ascend...

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Kokoda 1942 See-saw battle

Red blood was a running, emerald green saw it pour,
In the mountains of Kokoda, death on the see-saw,
400 fifteen to eighteen year old boys knew the score,
Just ole .303 rifles to stop...

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My father marched gung-ho towards anarchy,
Many friends by his side fell before the end,
They died brave in the face of danger and sin,
Their memories erased buried in mud blend.
 
The men went to their deaths...

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Better to be bold in battle
then benign in retreat!
No victory comes from actions prattle;
May honor be found in refusing defeat -

My vaults will not be breeched
by faults,
may we have a merry waltz
devoid of all unsavory...

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WORDS ON THE SAND (Part 1)

An old man came to the shore
To write on the sand
'Love' to his wife he always adored
She died as no more pain she could barely stand

Along she comes the watery...

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The Rebellious Man




If love was meant to be
Dare he stand before his own soul
And deny it

Will he risk his broken heart

Should he turn aside from the path of breaking
And the making of destiny
Call fate in...

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