Long Crawls Poems

It's Halloween!
Michael R. Burch

If evening falls
on graveyard walls
far softer than a sigh;

if shadows fly
moon-sickled skies,
while children toss their heads

uneasy in their beds,
beware the witch's eye!

If goblins loom
within the gloom
till playful pups grow terse;

if birds give...

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It's Halloween!
Michael R. Burch

If evening falls
on graveyard walls
far softer than a sigh;

if shadows fly
moon-sickled skies,
while children toss their heads

uneasy in their beds,
beware the witch's eye!

If goblins loom
within the gloom
till playful pups grow terse;

if birds give...

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Salvation of a Formalist, an Ode to Entropy
by Michael R. Burch

Entropy?
God's universal decree
That I get to be
Disorderly?
Suddenly
My erstwhile boxed-in verse is free?
Wheeeeee!



Eternal Currents
by Michael R. Burch

How can I write and not be true
to the rhythm...

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Sonnets LII-LX

The Endeavors of Lips
by Michael R. Burch

How sweet the endeavors of lips: to speak
of the heights of those pleasures which left us weak
in love’s strangely lit beds, where the cold springs creak:
for there is...

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A Stolen Memory
A Mirthful Chorus
By Sy Roth 


We surrounded him 
Asked to let go.
She stared at the misshapen face,
Unshaven sandpapery skin 
Eyelids a tabula rasa
Fluttery sere skin
And we could see the humor blossoming in his...

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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 darkening...

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Prose Poems

Something
by Michael R. Burch

Something inescapable is lost?lost like a pale vapor curling up into shafts of moonlight, vanishing in a gust of wind toward an expanse of stars immeasurable and void. Something uncapturable is...

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"Cocoon"

They say...
a New World 
traces over the old,
leaving the unaware,
erased, far behind 

the old unaware, 
left far behind,
crawls the walls
in its web of lies
spinning suspect 
strings of silk 
in the air

glistening diamond nets
slick and sticky...

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Vampire Poetry

Pale Though Her Eyes
by Michael R. Burch
 
Pale though her eyes,
her lips are scarlet
from drinking of blood,
this child, this harlot
 
born of the night
and her heart, of darkness,
evil incarnate
to dance so reckless,
 
dreaming of...

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Vampires
by Michael R. Burch

Vampires are such fragile creatures;
we fear the dark, but the light destroys them...
sunlight, or a stake, or a cross—such common things.
Still, late at night, when the bat-like vampire sings,
we heed his voice.

Centuries...

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I promise…I promise I won’t desert you
This hardship you’re facing at the moment is temporary
Tonight…tonight, I will show you love so true
By wiping your tears of sorrow and showing you tomorrow happily

I wake up to...

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My love was serpentine to the touch
I can't quite explain it...the love of mine
Had gone away from my sight and such
I can quiz my mind to say otherwise, my bittersweet sugar wine…

Why am I extremely...

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 POTD 25 Nov 2020

Manage your Stress … a peeling faded poster boldly declares 
I do get it about advertising campaigns. 
Enough to know that,
‘strategically placed ads’ catching the eye, is huge. 
But this poster...

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I don't know what to say to you...
I'm sorry Juliet
my once proud Juliet do you need an explanation
to why I'm struggling to find a solution to the question
'Why should I bother to talk to you...

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Words of a mother melting your spirit despite it being cold. Her loving you no matter what chasing that heart of gold. 
         "You don't need to...

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The Demon’s Shrill Cry of Dread and Horror

This tale of “The Demon’s Shrill Cry of Dread and Horror”
lives on in the mountain village of Gpeth Tor in the outlying 
region of the “Dark Forbidden Forest”...

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The Demon’s Shrill Cry of Dread and Horror

This tale of “The Demon’s Shrill Cry of Dread and Horror”
lives on in the mountain village of Gpeth Tor in the outlying 
region of the “Dark Forbidden Forest”...

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The flames of the furnace (well-travelled by wind
slowly glazing the rags of gray women chagrined
at the sight of a hair fleeing tresses now thinned) 
sometimes billow like waves flooding naves through the night,
when the lightning...

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This tale of “The Demon’s Shrill Cry of Dread and Horror”
lives on in the mountain village of Gpeth Tor in the outlying 
region of the “Dark Forbidden Forest” known for evil, death,
and lost souls. This...

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I have been used to living alone for so long
I am determined and easy going but headstrong
This morning was rather strange because I was on the train
I woke up with people gallivanting around me in...

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https://www.poetryoutloud.org/poem/the-convergence-of-the-twain/

The Convergence of the Twain
                              ...

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See them coming they are possessed 
See them coming they are obsessed 
See them coming they are undressed
Their blood filled eyes stares at us in disgust 
And big guns protrudes from their sides, they are...

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Apologies are due
Apologies are due
yet I am not the one to say them
Apologies are due but
but I am not the one
not today to give them
Fir all I have to give is a need to vent
a...

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You have breached the zone; tell me where else can the children roam? You have planted landmines on every corner and you have disrupted the social order. I hear sirens going off in my dreams...

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You conjured vulnerability
Everyone wants to see that side of me
You conjured vulnerability...possibly...
You want to free me from the chains of anxiety
Will you do that for me?
You conjured up demons in my brain
You drove them away...

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