Long Compel Poems

With my Uyghur poetry translations I am trying to build awareness of the plight of Uyghur poets who are being sent to Chinese "reeducation" concentration camps.

Elegy
by Perhat Tursun
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Asylum seekers, will...

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[Now ShallowMan is quite content
receiving FactoidMan’s consent
to quibble and express dissent
as long as keeping covenant
with fingers crossed and belfry bent
when viewing Facts in sealed cement:]

SM
“The Facts you give me circumvent
those ‘truths’ your chuckles supplement;
although they...

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Perhat Tursun

Perhat Tursun (1969-) is one of the foremost living Uyghur language poets, if he is still alive. Born and raised in Atush, a city in China's Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, Tursun began writing poetry...

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Free Power
                                 ...

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LEONARDO DA VINCI POEMS, EPIGRAMS AND QUOTES

These are my modern English translations of the poems, epigrams and quotes of Leonardo da Vinci. I believe the first six epigrams pertain to the current American election crisis...

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"The way I see it,
we're all related."
said my EcoTherapist.

While DNA and RNA include infinite permutation possibilities,
their primal core functions suggest simple bipolar relationships
between who's inside and what's outside,
and who is dominant so the Other recessed,
perhaps...

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Ghosts of the Sun Dance

1. The Path

A quest dating back through our history
Surpassing the flesh, a spiritual path
Human endurance, road to mystery
Dark trail winding through the gardens of wrath

It echoes through me, this deep ambition
Half...

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VIII

In the minds fixed eye I see five newly discovered graves,              
Headless lions sat atop an impregnable "Triumphal Gate";   ...

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I have a story that needs be told
A story I never knew if words can transcript
For it belongs when in dreams I enroll
Visions before or an afterlife if I shall seek

If it all shall begin…...

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This is the 1st half of a 2-part piece a tad too long for a single posting - a tale likely very close to factual - 


An ivory-tinted fluffy billow drifted through the sunrise -...

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A whirl, a gust, and a thunderous boom commenced,
Heartened by the latter soreness of silent night,
Shackled through the chill blows above,
A tempest, a storm,
Threshing the world,
Shaking the Prison of Plot,

The waters of the Holy Spirit...

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From north, south, east and west 
This is the town to beat the rest,
Where history and present blend
As through its many streets you wend. 

Where once a monastery so great
From every view would dominate,
Where Pilgrims...

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THE HURDLES: 

Explain this won't be a devour,
As all this while you considered a diva.
He'd set hurdles, Eva...
Which's breeding woes and fever.
I know you understand that's not trivial,
From the university of life, I have become...

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It’s with great difficulty I put my pen on this paper.
Struggling as to when and what to begin with.
Learning that life has its way of collapsing 
Our paths down to one: unchangeable, inescapable.
 
A journey...

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I'm not a saint though I compel myself to be one
I'm not a sinner, no, yet I can't outrun the ideology
Ascending into descension or am I descending into ascension
Maybe I, maybe I am only stuck...

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Last night,
when laid i my head to rest,
dreamt i a dream
dreadful;
I wept,though i was a deep in sleep,
I saw a baobab tree with three branches,
on it lays the colony of three birds of the 
air,
of...

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I stopped there, and saw two showing high rate
Of their will, on their face, to join with me;
But were hampered by narrow street and weight.

When reached us, with their eyes awry to see
Then looked at...

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Two fine films: The Lost City and Blood Diamond.
I joined Blood Diamond during a village massacre
and said to my wife A gun in every home.
Those devils would think twice
before razing the village and seizing the...

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I remember the night I first tasted sweet love.
Joining a boy for that magical, first time,
Under the glimmer of our own, fat moon,
Next to a silvery lake, sampling the divine.

We explored and shared the ultimate...

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EARTH from heavy loam the potter does preform                out of the ground a vessel with no breath   ...

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Pride negatory
Better to share His glory
God writes your story

Special kind of gain
We can only learn through pain
God may not explain

Treasure has a source
Wisdom is treasure, of course
God stores His resource

When God sends trouble
And we climb...

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There seems to be an excess of people
who question the validity of truth,
from post-modern professors teaching crap,
to poisoned and indoctrinated youth.

Some claim that objective truth can’t exist,
or if it does, it can never be known,
others...

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Spring whispers joy into the spirit
Promises of hope sing from wildflower 
Melodies, reflecting brilliant smiles
Falling down from moonlit skies

Spring breathes laughter into the heart
Inspiration over the silence of a thought
Prayers compel the soul to feel...

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..."Go now, Daniel, for what I have said is not                         ...

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The offender's indifference to the 'gift of forgiveness given',                          ...

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