Long Businessmen Poems

State of the Art (IV)

These are my "ars poetica" poems about the art and craft of writing poetry. 



Hearthside
by Michael R. Burch

“When you are old and grey and full of sleep...”  — W. ...

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Poems about Poems VI

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 Muse
with reprimands of Dr. Seuss.

The...

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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...

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" Good evening gentlemen, at last we meet.
I am so honored to bask in the presence of your company.
Meeting all of you global bankers has always been my fantasy,
so seeing you all before me now...

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Written in summer of 1976.


I used to eat my lunch with groups
of businessmen from Campbell Soups.

We drank a drink at lunch each day
Of Coca-Cola mixed with hay

And talked of pending corporate plans
And willow-haired orangutans.

I spent...

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UNQUOTABLE QUOTES: LI - Tongue-Teasers

If you want to give someone a « taste of his own medicine", you must first obtain sufficient quantities of the same medicine in the market, and if it’s out-of-stock -...

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The green village, the colored city, the ever familiar locality
Each path, tree, house, turn, each native I have left behind
But creepers, hedges have entangled with my leg and hand
The green crops fields, green hills, fruit...

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Speechless at Auschwitz
by Ko Un
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

At Auschwitz
piles of glasses
mountains of shoes ...
returning, we stared out different windows.

Ko Un speaks for all of us, by not knowing what to say about the...

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PROFESSOR POETS

These are poems about professor poets and other “intellectuals” who miss the main point of poetry, which is to connect with readers via pleasing sounds and the communication of emotion as well as meaning.



Professor...

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How much more can I take?
Searching for love only to find dust in the wind
Sick and tired of the same ol same ol
I know, I know I’ll never meet someone like you ever again
Pictures before...

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Dragon made the papers for that very unfortunate Church event, toots sweet.
Then Dragon, suddenly, decided to finger-paint billboards, all over the town.
He’d discovered painting was sooo cool, and wanted to, spread his joy around.
It wouldn’t...

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I asked Eddy on this and he asked me who told me. I said one of the lads but I don’t want you hurting him. He was fine. I said I knew a bank robber...

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Slipping gently towards entropy,
Ownership with an apostrophe.
Braid the loose frays of sanity
Till something true finally answers me.

Troops are marching over many lands,
Tagged cornflower blue--a worldwide brand.
Don't speak out or you will be banned,
Towers implode just...

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She sits on a street corner with a teardrop in her eye
Wishing she were in the cars of the people driving by
Her mother left with some john about two months ago
The man with the eviction...

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I bent down to pick up a penny from the frozen ground.
I could smell myself, the acrid stench of sweat and soot,
the taint of vapored vagrancy
that marked my movements, masking me from the reality that...

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MY NAME IS?
I always wake up feeling paranoid but never alone,
How many faces and shapes will I take?
Like a snake which sheds its skin, I change every time from one country to another, 
Wearing different...

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I could grow roses, and collect their nectar,
For newly wedded pairs’ perfume.
Or lilies, the Persian young lovers would secretly present their bashful beloveds.
Or could process the early-ripening fallen apple,
Foreigners would slowly have
Seeing the fiery sun...

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The legacy media is censoring the facts regarding the criminality of the Biden family. I understand why some are not aware of these facts, indisputable facts, backed by physical evidence, and first hand witness testimony....

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MY AFRICA
 
A dusty street, commuters meet
A taxi crowded, a route decided
Street vendors sell, plastic from China
Fresh fruit, dead meat, flies from hell
A cellphone rings, a message pings
Africa, my Africa, I know so well
 
Populations...

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I.
You see them on the media,
internet and TV,
people who say,”Take that man’s cash
and give all of it to me!”
Not caring that the rich fellow
has committed no crime,
that the cash the state steals from him
is a...

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7.	9 minutes at 9 pm 

Lamp to lamp, house to house
Street by street, we light hope, 
9 minutes at 9 pm, we light hope, 
We share our struggle like a team but with a spirit...

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Middleclass alcoholics 

After a heart attack my life as seaman was over, so I went back to school 
and trained to become a shrink helping people with addiction problems
and for this I got a diploma....

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When government spends more than it collects in taxes,
it borrows money from a central bank, and must pay it back with interest.
Government never has the money when the loan is due,
so the burden of this...

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The powers that be, undefined, ruthless, opaque authority 
Shapeless, bodiless, upstanding folk, coercing the majority 
Overseeing applications, supplications, ensuring conformity 
Specialists in quagmires, minefields, esoteric bureaucracy. 

The powers that be, model citizens, high ranking royalty...

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Green is the color I forsee
With my very own eyes, I truly do see.
You see green is a very lucky color you see
A green object is easy to see
 Where O Where can that Clover...

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