Long Dalliance Poems
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Sappho Translations I
Sappho, fragment 132 (Lobel-Page 132)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
1.
I have a delightful daughter
fairer than the fairest flowers, Cleis,
whom I cherish more than all Lydia and lovely Lesbos.
2.
I have a lovely daughter
with a face like the fairest flowers,
my beloved Cleis …
It bears noting that Sappho mentions her daughter and brothers, but not her husband. We do not know if this means she was unmarried, because so many of her verses have been lost.
Sappho, fragment 131 (Lobel-Page 131)
loose translations/interpretations by Michael R. Burch
1.
You reject me, Attis,
as if you find me distasteful,
flitting off to Andromeda ...
2.
Attis, you forsake me
and flit off to Andromeda ...
Sappho, fragment 140 (Lobel-Page 140)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
He is dying, Cytherea, the delicate Adonis.
What shall we lovers do?
Rip off your clothes, bare your breasts and abuse them!
Sappho, fragment 36
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Vain woman, foolish thing!
Do you base your worth on a ring?
Sappho, fragment 130
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
May the gods prolong the night
—yes, let it last forever!—
as long as you sleep in my sight.
... a sweet-voiced maiden ...
—Sappho, fragment 153, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
I have the most childlike heart ...
—Sappho, fragment 120, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
There was no dance,
no sacred dalliance,
from which we were absent.
—Sappho, fragment 19, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
I love the sensual
as I love the sun’s ecstatic brilliance.
—Sappho, fragment 9, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
I love the sensual
as I love the sun’s splendor.
—Sappho, fragment 9, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
You anointed yourself
with most exquisite perfume.
—Sappho, fragment 19, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Awed by the moon’s splendor,
stars covered their undistinguished faces.
Even so, we.
—Sappho, fragment 34, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Keywords/Tags: Sappho, Lesbos, Greek, translation, epigram, epigrams, love, sex, desire, passion, lust, lesbian, LGBTQ
From mouth to ear across a lifetime lived,
traveling strings tying lives together thread on thread.
Every one word building lifetimes;
bonded mud of bricks to house
our broken bags of trailing flesh.
We will hold each others heart,
we will hold each others head up high.
Better or worse for the word or two that has made,
will forever make, and always is,
the difference.
Speak this word or that, watch the matter of it all unfold,
past lives shaped and shaping now
in crucibles of all our conversations.
Words to bridge and touch this world,
like knives or axes falling,
slicing moments each peeled back,
revealing bullets spent and sailing
on to wounded tearful souls.
Comfort words,
words of love,
different shapes and sizes wrapped
in different voices heard.
Inflections, accents, whispered,
loudly shaped intense of spirit,
colored by emotion to enforce.
Chosen words of purpose:
dispatched, planned,
let fly in haste,
erecting endless layers to our waste.
Tools of our intention common to our time,
reserved and planned, chosen with meticulous care,
whose definitions matter more than when or where.
Piercing silent dreams,
floating on the breath of every God,
making mysteries of all we seem to be.
Mirrors made of silence once,
we soon are made of words that move us
through a doorway, joining into life.
Today, a workshop for the poet. Write about a cup.
Standing empty, purpose unfulfilled.
Imagination startled as I smash the cup inside my head.
A million shards of broken pottery lying on the floor.
Broken poems and promises lying on the floor.
Shards thrown out of context as are we.
Broken souls from out a shattered God.
Each shard, a refugee. You and me.
Metaphors attached to all the brokenness we own.
Cups of purpose seeking our fulfillment.
Joined to make a whole of all we hold;
become a cup our truth will then unfold.
What began as empty, filled with our life’s portion,
sharing, sipping, spilling all along the way.
Losing contents we may label dear
until the final tipping of a cup left upside down.
What words escape our pens that are not truth.
Whose content change the soul from which we bleed
Whether subject cup or love, or other siphoned dalliance,
at our finish will complete a lifetime’s cupping need.
Although I've tried to understand your reasons for what you do,
sometimes I just turn my switch off, and ignore the nonsense.
Repeating the same ignorant remarks which obviously tweek my heart and soul,
you've really been asking my permission to leave and not come back,
because I was just a dalliance to you - "Hot Love In the Summertime"...
You take beautiful people, animals and creations and twist them around
to suit your 'manly' thoughts and desires, turning a beautiful flower
into a withered-up twiglet with no hope or life left.
Those are YOUR choices - not mine! I see beauty, and am mesmerized
by God's glorious developments within the universe.
You see only the flaming asteroids which threaten to destroy
this wonderful world we live in.
You hope for chaos and destruction, and you have a destructive personality.
You respect nothing, and prove it with your words and actions.
If only you could realize or even care what destruction you have caused,
and try to repair the damage by helping the beauty to blossom and bloom,
spreading yet again...
But! You obviously could care less about true happiness, peace and faith,
for your faith lies only in the knowledge that (finally) one day
you'll succeed in stifling out your own sordid life,
ne'er taking notice of all the wreckage you leave behind - intentionally.
What could have happened in your life
to make you hurt yourself knowingly...hopingly...
...Continuing to commit suicide on a daily basis?
What evil has befallen your soul to make you hate so much?
Or, is it mere child's play to you to make ev'ryone and ev'rything around you
wish they'd ne'er known a person as cold and nasty as you are?
My thoughts will wander to you from time to time in the future,
but they will immediately be dismissed - pushed away - like you did me.
My love is a special gift, but you don't see beauty, so you cannot know real love.
Therefore, I will spend the rest of my days striving to erase the hatred,
and bring love into the world, whether you like it or not.
God's love is the most beautiful thing there will e'er be,
and it shines like a beacon in my soul, but your lighthouse crumbled long ago,
and you don't even want to rebuild.
So, goodbye to your darkness, hello peaceful world.
To the Circuit of Energy permeating the garden, sustaining the canopy permeate
Washing through with waterfalls, cascading rivers, and upwelling springs the fermement
Was magically darkened when Eve took her classes at Satan’s grove
Where one tree (or gate or pedestal) stood, and the devil appeared like hand in glove
To capture her attention, draw her away from her programmed obligations
Little did she know that the devils deal would lead to abnegation
Of her rightful role as a helpmate, swquaw and poets wife
To rule as co-creators, in innocence, with her husband – Adam – and without strife
Although the invitation to new knowledge might have raised her curiosity peaked
‘Perhaps’, she thought, ‘only to have this new experience’ would raise her from meek
Humility. And give her new insight into helping her man: new insight new skills
How was she to know that the tree of good and evil would not fulfill
Any decent role in sustaining the garden, or giving of strength
Had she known that she would be banned from paradise, and removed a full length
From the easeof leisure, the peac of pleasure, which passes all understanding
What a tragedy then, when she engaged the devil without comprehending
The consequence of taking that fatal action, to partake
In the fruit and lust of the wicked tree: when after she began to fake
The full collapse of her station to assist the 1st Man, her original matrimony
She had, perhaps unwittingly disrupted her union with man, and sundered its harmony
With the role of Adam as a spokesman and poet was now broken
The life from before, when he merelyspoke and observed had become a token
Memory. Speech itself a vestige of what life had been when it was perfect
For Eve had introduced vast new knowledge through her dalliance when the devil depicted
A fuller knowledge of all the trees of the garden once fecund
Now all that once gave life in full, a mere second
To Eves infinite question; to probe the everlasting and to question
From what source, and what deep came the gall of God’s order not to mention
The mercurial things that she had seen in Eden, the sweet lull and whisper
And perhaps her fall, the devils gambit settled the mist-in-her
Ah, the fortitude of a circle
the circular wisdom
of spring to summer fall to winter
the spinning wheel’s twist of threads -
at once both self-reliant and reliant
my soul to embryo seed to seedling
the mettle it takes for the genesis;
for my poppy pod to wake and break
a tiny speck of matter a fleck of duality unleashed
I surrender my dormancy to the earth -
roots reach deep like pale squiggly fingers
..for my kernel was laid to rest to bustle to life..
while my headstrong head pushes up through the soil
I come to be.. like a new idea taking shape
a physical being grounded
while seeking the realm of the Sun
the source of spirit as essential
as the dark womb from which I emerge
with a heart budding with the universe from nothing
I sprout as a sprig from a rounded grain
conceived in a gold-dusted flurry of furry buzz..
a bumblebee's dalliance with the center of a whorl
a mote of pollen so mite-like -- but
m i g h t y
in purpose potential and power
woven together in the art of creation
wind-driven autumn rains and sips of melted snow
..mother’s milk during the passage of time..
sweetly feeds the gentle needs for my tender birth
daystar’s dabble-dance with shadows
charm the chill from the cradle of the garden floor -
warm ginger dapples flit to find me between
canopy gaps in swish and sway..
mini-spots mirroring the disk of the Sun reminds me;
the image of what I’ll become
when my solar heart shines in a petal-chalice of flame..
rapture stirs the layers of humus
penetrating my essence with a ripening
stoking my fortitude to fulfill my destiny
to break free of that which holds me down
and reach ever higher inspired by a promise;
the golden circle of solace.. the bull's-eye in the sky
whose glow does kiss and grow my soul -
my inner space of bright sure to blaze
in a blossom cup’s confinement
my soul to embryo seed to seedling
sown to assure my flowering
my earthy ascension fulfills Nature’s cycle of nativity;
above the loam I rise to unfurl
and lift my airy leaves’ uncurl up high
in praise of the light
as the end of a gray season curves
into the festive yellow equinox of resurgence
Filched Physiognomy - Mine!
Absolute zero escape
velocity guts dance
sing days (contra and square),
cuz metabolic full abundance
abdominal adipose tissue acceptance
not in accordance
with light as a feather
miss lost acquaintance
the boy within forced admittance
as sure man tanks of fat did advance
shotgun marriage demanded allegiance
to pledge lifetime alliance
no room for allowance
crushing lightness of being ambiance
nor allies to help me combat
battle fatigue require
ring superman endurance
to muster strength
to stand erect else ambulance
will whisk away husky
embarrassing appearance
loose fitting clothing
jelly roll appurtenance
overnight digital readout,
asper body mass index
scaled quick ascendance,
thus when showering,
I look askance
fearing bulging balloon
will necessitate assistance
else... diet of worms
as only assurance
safeguarding body electric
against hecklers at open casket
no matter, a small perchance
crowd in attendance
yea... eventual cremation
after life only fat chance
to alleviate present circumstance
heavy matter fails security clearance
the price for astute cognizance
weak willpower alighting countenance
esse pie ying sweet treats
now measures taken to counterbalance
to fight temptation and dalliance
overruling feasting craving delectation
to restore trim deliverance
love handles around equator
no magician can render disappearance
yes the discontinuance
of just dessert must maintain distance
without being weighed
down with disturbance
by heaviest haunch
ain't no elegance
lugging extra encumbrance
when throughout my early life,
skinny, yet able to steel glance
mirrored reflection now grievance,
where wistful memory
ha...ironic insouciance
more so than
today finds intolerance,
thus woebegone issuance
thorn in muss hide
to experience jubilance
hmm...maybe a strong
arm can lance
excess flab quite a nuisance
to defy gravity, why penance
sans unsightly paunch
yours truly laments skin
tight fit, thus petulance
lame excuse unwanted protuberance
necessitates dedicated pursuance
recollection of washboard
abdomen impossible, yes
nothing accomplished by remonstrance!
I felt ashamed when I realized that, in fact,
Life is a masquerade party, where I stood without a mask,
I wandered with my uncovered face beneath the chandeliers,
Among specters and shadows hiding their secrets under false veneers.
In a vast hall, where echoes were hushed,
I, with my raw sincerity, like a secretive flush,
Watched them waltz, twirling in a tune’s embrace,
Their masks softly glinting under the lights and disgrace.
Alive, beneath their mask, was an unwritten story,
Hidden deep, like a treacherous wound, in all its fiery glory,
I looked, feeling the shame grow climatically within,
When I understood that unmasking was my only sin.
Looking at my empty palms, the missing rings,
Fear embraced me as if I were weaving illusions, not real things,
In this gathering, where no one is what they seem,
I now fear that without a mask, I'm a rare being on this dream’s seam.
It’s strange on this stage to be the only authentic actor,
Not wearing the same charm as the elastic imposters,
They play scripts they have no intention to write,
While I bleed dreams on the planks, in an act of bravery, without hypocrisy, stark and bright.
It’s hard to understand that, indeed, people adore the ball,
They dance a fake tango, a feigned happiness they install,
But I am bare, transparent, unmade-up, and warm,
I’ve revealed my heart in rhythms of undiluted sincerity’s form.
And the shame I feel blooms in my chest like a wound,
Seeing how everyone wears makeup and they seem to me so misaligned,
I now long to wear a mask too, though I’d be just a feather,
Flying through the vast halls, where facades dance together, all tethered.
I leave the party, thoughtful and with a leaden silence,
I retreat behind the curtains of night, to watch the stars, the moon's dalliance,
And yet, in my discreet darkness, I hope to find her,
Who, maybe, also hides behind a mask, waiting to lay it aside, to be surer.
Should I return, don a mask, or remain with an open face?
Should I play a role or always be raw and unchased?
I watch as the dawn unfolds and The Question within me remains unresolved,
While the rising sun illuminates an actor with body and soul unaltered.
The simplicity of yearning. It burns softly, like a hand grazing over a candle. A mouth full of sweet nothings to be spilled onto the damp from your tears pillow, alone. To be alone feels so excruciatingly bittersweet, for who doesn’t love their own space. The house empty, discarded of ghosts and all spirits and souls. The backing track playing whatever melody inspires you this month, falling asleep to the buzzing static sound of the late-night television show with guests you’d never heard of.
Beaming orange light travels through the open curtains, sunrise comes to you like a gentle kiss on your forehead. When you’re with him, the bottles shatter to the floor, you watch them drop in slow motion. Lay yourself down on the shards and taste the earth, the soil of a graveyard for you believe you will be reborn.
Strands of hair dancing over face, pull them aside as the morning calls for you. The alarm clock is a ticking time bomb, waiting for the absence of sleep to drive you further into an eternity of rest.
You replace caresses with a hand clamped around your throat. A sweet teenage dream of desire, virginity intact, a cherry uneaten. Bruised wrists you wear like accessories, secrets dripped into your ears like poison. But I am still infatuated, more so when you show me the seventh wonder of the world. There’s pleasure in pain, even if I had never felt it.
Conflate our bodies in the early hours, hidden from the sun but the moon sees our dalliance. Deceive your morals for what is an urge not a right. I am the spider, stalking you like prey until you plunge into the spiral of my gossamer. Struck by the innocent ideation of what it means to be a woman, gentle and delicate. I am a force, and you quiver in phobia, beads of sweat dampen my grasp. Pulled apart by heat, run. Sprint from consequences.
The half shadow of your silhouette haunts the minimal memories I have. Breathe in your gasps for air, I swallow your desperation. She is eternal, and who am I to compare? Architype of an angel, the treasure you seek.
Pain ripples through me, a tidal wave of yearning. For there is nothing simplistic about the ache, a longing for passion.
Serendipity came into play, when I stumbled upon a gallery,
I was a tourist in a seaside town, shopping midst a vast array
while blinding rays of sun’s reflection, caught my close propinquity
In one window, several seascapes, bucolic seaside scenes
but, one small painting called to me,..a harbinger of all my fantasies
I cupped my hands around my eyes...and that was when I sighed....
It took my breath, and I was kept a captive by the artist's pride...
A lovely landscape of a town, the village of my dreams
This very street now, whence I stand, but from a different theme
Redolent of days erstwhile of scenes, from time quite long ago
Before the tourists trampled ground, and shopped for souvenirs
This village poised, beneath the hills...turned back two hundred years
Where cottage homes wore faded frames, on efflorescence sands
demesne spreading wild and free, and skies were azure bands
Narrow lanes branched far away from roads that went astray
dipping down to petrichor dunes, where grasses bend in wind
A general store and a blacksmith shop, and summer never ends
Seagulls glide with angel wings, against the afternoon
The peaceful lift that lives within, how wonderful it looms...
With a dalliance of my own epiphany, ..my thoughts are wild and free
how ephemeral it would be if I could freeze this day
If I could pull it out to see and visit it...again,
If I could bring it back when I am down, ...this peaceful afternoon...
Where leaves would never fall from trees, so ancient in their sway
And the gentle slopes would never know cruel storms of winter days
Where tears would never fall, again, and age, a timeless thing
If I could paralyze this town, the way it was back then
If time could be my captive prize.....if only for awhile…
I'd smile, if once I were allowed, a chance, to step inside
___________________________________________________
3/15/16 For Contest: "A Day In A Town" Sponsored by Nayda Ivette Negron
Required Words Used:
1.Bucolic 2. Dalliance 3. Demesne 4. Efflorescence 5. Ephemeral 6. Epiphany 7. Erstwhile 8. Harbinger 9. Petrichor 10.Propinquity 11.Redolent 12. Serendipity
Les Bijoux (The Jewels)
by Charles Baudelaire
loose translation by Michael R. Burch
My lover nude and knowing my heart's whims
Wore nothing more than a few bright-flashing gems;
Her art was saving men despite their sins;
She ruled like harem girls crowned with diadems!
She danced for me with a gay but mocking air,
My world of stone and metal sparking bright;
I discovered in her the rapture of everything fair;
Nay, an excess of joy where the spirit and flesh unite!
Naked she lay and offered herself to me,
Parting her legs and smiling receptively,
As gentle and yet profound as the rising sea,
Till her surging tide encountered my cliff, abruptly.
A tigress tamed, her eyes met mine, intent ...
Intent on lust, content to purr and please!
Her breath, both languid and lascivious, lent
An odd charm to her metamorphoses.
Her limbs, her loins, her abdomen, her thighs,
Oiled alabaster, sinuous as a swan,
Writhed pale before my calm clairvoyant eyes;
Like clustered grapes her breasts and belly shone.
Skilled in more spells than evil imps can muster,
To break the peace which had possessed my heart,
She flashed her crystal rocks’ hypnotic luster
Till my quietude was shattered, blown apart.
Her waist awrithe, her breasts enormously
Out-thrust, and yet ... and yet, somehow, still coy ...
As if stout haunches of Antiope
Had been grafted to a boy ...
The room grew dark, the lamp had flickered out.
Mute firelight, alone, lit each glowing stud;
Each time the fire sighed, as if in doubt,
It steeped her pale, rouged flesh in pools of blood.
This translation has been adopted by **** and escort websites!
The Perfect Courtesan
by Michael R. Burch
after Baudelaire, for the courtesans
She received me into her cavities,
indulging my darkest depravities
with such trembling longing, I felt her need ...
Such was the dalliance to which we agreed—
she, my high rider;
I, her wild steed.
She surrendered her all and revealed to me—
the willing handmaiden, delighted to please,
the Perfect Courtesan of Ecstasy.