Long Crevasses Poems

Translation of Eric Mottram’s A Faithful Private 7 with excerpts from “Notes on Poetics” by T. Wignesan

(Note: With this post, I bring to a close EM’s pamphlet collection: Faithful Private, GENERA editions by Colin Simms,...

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competing cousins, interbreeding homo-sapiens
  hominins humming mostly human song
  altruistic generalisers, ever close to dying ways
  opportunistic, never staying long

  self-aware, inquisitive, enlarging brains, empathising
  real representative intelligence
  modelling...

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As October 1 approaches, HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY……………………
I have enormous tracts of land and vast volumes of water, but cannot feed myself.
So I spend $1 billion to import rice and another $2 billion on milk.
I produce...

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The Letter         

A young man strolled along the waterfront,
His mind and heart at ease.
Said an old man, sitting on an upturned punt,
Gazing out towards the sea. 

“Come...

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Some days I wake up 
Brush my teeth with anxiety 
And braid my hair with pain
There are days I chafe at my dark skin
As insults burn holes in my heart as I walk in
The school...

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The passionate young man on his way to his love
Walked by a lake carrying a snow-white dove
Inside his shirt he held it close to his heart
When he heard a song - an enchanting work of...

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Early Poems XV

Ambition
by Michael R. Burch 

Men speak of their “ambition”
and I smile to hear them say
that within them burns such fire,
such a longing to be great ...

But I laugh at their “Ambition”
as their wistfulness...

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the cause of spreading over of the fragrance
from our secret myrobalan to every side of the pillows
is not only such that in the morning 
an empty ink-pot says to the rain-water 
you are beautiful 

it...

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Sappho Translations III by Michael R. Burch


Bed the bride with the beautiful feet,
or bring her to me!
—Sappho, fragment 103b, translation by Michael R. Burch

I long helplessly for love. Gazing into your eyes not even Hermione...

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These are poems about shadows and shadowy things...

Transplant
by Michael R. Burch

You float, unearthly angel, clad in flesh
as strange to us who briefly knew your flame
as laughter to disease. And yet you laugh.
Behind your smile, the...

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If your love was like the Namib;
Mountainous and bare,
Would you dig deep for water?
Would you scour the ridged crevasses there?
For something that moved,
Within and without,
Trying to remove, any and all doubt.

If your love was a...

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We Are One


Dear Ancient Sister
I hear your distant calls finding me on a gentle breeze
You have lived in my dreams for many seasons

My voice 
Your voice
My soul
Your soul
And our Coming of Age

I have always known...

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And after all, all these, my love
I adore you and will always love you, my dove
After so much hubbub and confusion
After so much chaos and tribulation
After so many wacky discussions
After so many funny contentions
After so...

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Those Midnight Infatuations 


 


 


1. 


You're the water  


on the phone Sun 


that I crave. 


To become the 


dopamine blocker  


in my brain. 


 


2. 


I am the minuscule rolled balls ...

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As usual frozen seagulls fly above us every night,
blind I approach our bed in the darkness,
tracing the linear surfaces of the embroidery,
as their long-winged spans shadow the pillow mounds.

The salty residue found on your lips,
Falls...

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On the western horizon where the sun goes to bed,
there stands the Canadian Rockies,
so majestic in size,
solid and immovable,
yet fluid and ever-changing.

I am awed by their beauty,
the way the sun reflects off the snow,
making them...

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this will be good and slippery
in a whistling fall from grace
feel free to edit in a picture of your choice
the more grotesque the more accurate
while glancing at your wrist watch
over and over when you knew
your...

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I took my mountain for a walk without a leash
Restraints don't come in gigantic sizes
We strolled along a path near by the beach
A sign stood out, No Pets Allowed

Rock ranges must be controlled according to...

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I scream, at the top of my lungs
No sound, comes out
Silent, curdling screams
Is, all I have left, now
I wrestle; I fight, with all, my physical might
While, being forced down 
By the mighty strength, of many...

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In a weightless state of tranquility, 
paraphrasing relentless thoughts of motion 
in my head into words, which 'til now 
have laid dormant in unsung verse, waiting
for you to shine brightly upon them. 

Freshly painted impressions...

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We were best friends. 
We were lovers.
Inexorably linked.
For such a commitment-phobe, I fell in love quickly.  But I didn’t fall, really.
I dove headfirst.
I chose her.  No, she chose me. 
She was always lurking...

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Time froze solid over crystal ledges 
Not withstanding planetary degrees of cold
Eroded ages in deep space remain
Below zero beyond the inner planets
A pure white landscape far away
Fixed in the void a world displaced

Through no fault...

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These are epigrams by Michael R. Burch


Road to Recovery
by Michael R. Burch

It’s time to get up and at ’em
and out of this rut that I’m sat in.

A man may attempt to burnish pure gold, but...

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Flightless, the smallest such bird,
he’s hopping about madly now,
dexterous little feet grab what they can -
he lost his beak decades ago
to a merciless marauder drone –
here, some tiny, thorny little twigs,
there, a footful of leaves...

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Ten ping pong balls on a bed stout brewed in radiators. To exact temperatures of course. Lucifer Christopher cross dangling on beams. In towers. Known but unseen. In clear view of crystal goblets. Chant then...

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