Long Calcified Poems

It had been a hellish week.

On Monday
my lonely and tired AfricanAmerican husband
told me, as gently as possible,
that what I had hoped was a temporary separation
is to be extended into perpetuity.

This separation had been scheduled to...

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EcoMinisters of Earth Rights
CoArise!

EcoLogicians of resilient encircling might
CoArise!

EcoLegislators of bicameral balancing disposition
CoArise!

What is our highest and best CommonSense
of currently elected policy-choosers?
Where are our optimal health outcomes 
of proactive CommonSense?
What does vast emptiness of positive results
suggest...

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Love murmurs in my ear that to be hunted
is infinitely more enviable than to be the hunter.
                  ...

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Thanks so much for forwarding
these John Paul Lederach stories
of un-learning academic approaches
to peace mediation.

I wonder if you remembered
my ongoing certification process
for justice-restoring mediation
in complex multicultural conflicting histories;
which are typically antithetical to resilient peace
through ongoing safe...

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A Vain Word
by Michael R. Burch
 
Oleanders at dawn preen extravagant whorls
as I read in leaves’ Sanskrit brief moments remaining
till sunset implodes, till the moon strands grey pearls
under moss-stubbled oaks, full of whispers, complaining
to the...

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           In the depths of desolation where death 
is presiding in a smug kind of cocoon of parasite,
lies, a heart of calcified care, buried deep...

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I surf through the crooning crests
of warm, blue waters,
breathing poetry and prose,
carved in topaz and turquoise,
for I am the goddess
of the bittersweet estuary,
crowned with foamy salt and sea glass,
intoxicated by inked
sapphires and solitude.
This quill longs...

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              To wallow in the fires is a tempting 
surrender.
A swan dive into the maelstromic implode 
of mushroom clouds, return to 
sender....

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I

how could i know him his eyes say
but my eyes reply which of us may speak to that
be busy in the house that needs fixing
despite histories in three
and homes as safe as the clicking of...

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I am not a blank slate to score upon again
Yet there is this gap, this hollow place
That wants a name. I search for it in vain
The alien presence of eyes, and of face
Nothing comes back...

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Today is the birthday of that
long gone soul. The one spinning
in the centrifuge, even now,
on the counter, as the technician
in the lab coat pulls seven G's
worth of DNA from calcified skull,
in an effort to know...

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it was that dull ache that kept her going

a longing for freedom whatever that meant

confined to the straight-jacket of her mind

she tore at the shackles until her heart bled

clots obstructed safe burden-less passage 

stenosed angry...

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“Wicked Web of Woes” 

Is there a reason
to rhyme when 
lifeless fingers
breathe toxic agony,
whilst disgraced 
quill suffocates
from wildering 
riddles swerving to
the stillness 
of calcified air? 
As today, my heart 
keeps pacing,
searching for a 
symphony of...

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Passion fell by the wayside
Cold Phoenix doubt rose from the ashes
smouldering on the inside

Broken candlelight date invitations
rue glow leaves grey matter with dark, unsettling thoughts
Giving restless peace of mind, 
plenty wary settle down reservations

Apache war...

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Well maybe I should apologize 
Maybe using free verse on the internet 
Isn't the best way to vent my health
But its just the facts man like officer Friday on dragnet

I cant really help the misspelling...

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Born into light and innocence, possessing a heart with an endless capacity to love, my appetite for life was abundant.  

Anchored in purity and virtuousness, hopes and dreams blossomed in my young mind lending...

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You are not enough...
Your body, the lethargic blood in your veins, little red rivers...
Your aging heart, gallantly beating – 
I want to kiss its straining crimson chambers,
Bless it, the poor doomed thing...
You are just not...

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He trusted that writer’s block was just a lull and searched for his pen

Ink had dried for some time and his worn mind scratched for words

A lullaby or even a tristich would do if an...

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Your face contorts in a twisted effort
Plaintive in non-decorous reverberation
A terrain around a pair of distant orbs 
Lost in extemporaneous consternation
To ward off the fear of unwanted evanescence
Upon the wanton revelation
Of a day you wish...

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I stand at the precipice of remembrance,
Caught between the rotting crops of yesterday
And the crisp dawn of reality,
While a torchbearer beckons my soul to Dante’s Inferno.
Ashen raindrops drench me to my marrow.

For I’ve been cursed...

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 Written on April 19th 2025 for Sara Jama's The Chaos in my Heart Contest

I am wrapped in darkness, crippled by the chaos in my heart.
Swallowing tangled foxgloves of regret, I spiral.
Into a hays of...

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every day seven hundred million video clips
are shot and stored on memory chips
then uploaded to some video cloud
and vaporously saved for society proud

the dog tricks, the hilarious cats, 
pretty daughters, the mundane facts
the sunsets and...

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Serenity

Two more decades will have ground ageing bones to a sound mightily creaking
Joints spaces diminished, mobility hampered, once kind flexibility rapidly waned
Air flow restricted in lungs stretched to the limit, vascular flow crushingly strained
Skin flaccid...

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The wicked souls like gasoline light up 
Afire without remorse sorrow and heat
As if Hiroshima Nagasaki
In bright atomic pillars of fire burn 
Unquenched like a mad lunatic bonfire 
The judged the condemned the damned all...

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Walking on the graveyard of defeated souls
With an unforgiving limp of a broken heart
There was no light or warmth, only the cold
Was this to be my home, nothing left of my own.

Just an empty vessel...

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