Long Bewitches Poems

Sappho fragment #155
translation by Michael R. Burch 

A short revealing frock?
It's just my luck
your lips were made to mock!

*

Sappho fragment #156
translation by Michael R. Burch 

She keeps her scents
in a dressing-case.
And her sense?
In some undiscoverable...

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Epigrams by Michael R. Burch

If brevity is the soul of wit
then brevity and levity 
are the whole of it.
—Michael R. Burch

To write an epigram, cram.
If you lack wit, scram!
—Michael R. Burch

Conformists of a feather
flock together.
—Michael...

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Come Down
by Michael R. Burch

for Harold Bloom

Come down, O, come down
from your high mountain tower.
How coldly the wind blows,
how late this chill hour ...

and I cannot wait
for a meteor shower
to show you the time
must be...

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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...

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Juvenilia: Early Poems VIII

These are early poems of mine, written in my teens as a high school and college student. 

Moon Lake
by Michael R. Burch

Starlit recorder of summer nights,
what magic spell bewitches you?
They say that...

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These are poems about starlight and moonlight, moons and stars, dreams and visions, illuminations and intimations …



Will There Be Starlight
by Michael R. Burch 

Will there be starlight
tonight
while she gathers
damask
and lilac
and sweet-scented heathers?

And will she find...

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Mine own son
God, did bless me
sunshine that's mind
mine own heart's petals bloom 
joy i did shed while i did see thee
in mine arms wast w'rthwhile

lullabies sung as thee didst lie in thy crib 
meaningful mem'ries...

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sun rays settle skies
prism shelters diversity -
kids breaking hard bricks

wind spreads gentle seeds
prayer evokes mute silence -
too many lost souls

rain drops whet dry soil
scope scoops whirlpools of dry tears -
god should know better

earth circles tailspins
faith...

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Sappho Translations II

That country wench bewitches your heart?
Hell, her most beguiling art’s
hiking her dress
to seduce you with her ankles' nakedness!
Sappho, fragment 57, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Sappho, fragment 138, loose translations/interpretations by Michael R....

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Ancient Greek and Roman Epigrams

That country wench bewitches your heart?
Hell, her most beguiling art’s
hiking her dress
to seduce you with her ankles' nakedness!
Sappho, fragment 57, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Stranger, rest your weary legs beneath...

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PLATO EPIGRAM TRANSLATIONS

These epitaphs and other epigrams have been ascribed to Plato...

Mariner, do not ask whose tomb this may be,
But go with good fortune: I wish you a kinder sea.
—Michael R. Burch, after Plato

We left...

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                      Wood Nymph, wraps white 
gossamer legs in hello, as branch shakes 
in obvious...

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The dawn spoke her name like a silken secret
carried carefree by the tradewinds of lust and larceny
imported from the traderoutes of paradise and pandemonium, 
sequined with violet venom she venerates the virtue of volition
her love...

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Moon Lake
by Michael R. Burch

Starlit recorder of summer nights,
what magic spell bewitches you?
They say that all lovers love first in the dark...
Is it true?
Is it true?
Is it true?

Starry-eyed seer of all that appears
and all that...

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I make haste to the earth 
And anoint its rebirth
When my mother, the cloud, is above, 
And then mildly caress 
The irradiant dress
Of the hills with immaculate love. 

I descend upon leas 
And respond to...

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BEWITCHING  NIGHT        

                        ...

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As my wife once taught me
Women knew all about trimming
and cleaning
and harvesting the fertile forests of Earth
long before I ever thought to depilate my back
and other parts.

As my wife continues teaching me
I am not quite...

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Written: October 10, 2023   
Night Bewitches                            ...

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I think of you being a universe away—
it cuts like broken glass, being apart from you
and all alone and without a bright ray
that's you to keep me from growing so blue. 

If I could fly...

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Storms glistening sporadically
Inspiration wavering dramatically
I can’t move like I should!
I am fighting against the reveling, reviling flood
Evidence of many spawning deaths cannot stop me
And the zombie maggots grow as they are left rotting
I can’t stop...

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As a child, I yearned to glimpse the ghostly trace, 
Wake at midnight, staring into the mirror's face, 
Months passed by in this eerie, haunting quest, 
Till one fateful night, fear put me to the...

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She will rise up from the water, in the midday afternoon
Lightly vaulting from the darkness, wearing beads of jewel-toned sea
Splashing forth as if a fountain,  spilling locks of brilliant gold
Wearing combs adorned with seashells,...

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She will rise from the water, in the midday afternoon
Lightly vaulting from darkness and a bright diamond throne
Splashing forth as a fountain, spilling colors of gold
Wearing combs made of seashells, from deep in the cold

She...

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Creasing Out Happiness

My little luxuries of life I refuse to barter
With Solomon's or Queen Sheba's treasures
Its ecstasy bewitches and beguiles me
As pirates to laden vessels to surfeit

Scrubbed and freshened from bath salts
I prepare for my...

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In the velvety cloak of night, it bewitches so,
A realm of dreams where secrets softly flow.
Under the tender, moon's enchanting light,
Night bewitches, with its alluring might.

Stars above, like diamonds gleam,
In the midnight sky, a shimmering...

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