Long Dalliance Poems

Rejection
a roundel by Geoffrey Chaucer
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Your beauty from your heart has so erased
Pity, that it's useless to complain;
For Pride now holds your mercy by a chain.

I'm guiltless, yet my sentence has...

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Veronica Franco translations

Veronica Franco (1546-1591) was a Venetian courtesan who wrote literary-quality poetry and prose.

Capitolo 19: A Courtesan's Love Lyric (I) 
by Veronica Franco
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

"I resolved to make a virtue of...

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Stood I there, that last day,
On an iron bridge...
An aqueduct by design,
Where, looking dreamily out over
The Ernes Lower Lough,
My compressed shadow 
Momentarily paused -
To contently recline:
Amidst coy Junes radiant beams 
of sweet benign!
All was stilled,...

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Renee Vivien Translations


Song
by Renée Vivien
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

When the moon weeps,
illuminating flowers on the graves of the faithful,
my memories creep
back to you, wrapped in flightless wings.

It's getting late; soon we will sleep
(your eyes...

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Do not vainly look in those remote
Places,
That, once, were acquainted with a 
Small part of me;                   ...

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skinny island rump
  highway seas churning the horizon under turbulent skies
  entity England
  migration waves still grounding along the continental shelf
  monarchs, priests and lords
  relaunching history and hope, the...

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“Air becomes wind when it’s agitated.” Lucretius
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Thank you for joining me in the studio today,” Mr. Zephyr. 
“Glad to be here, Bob. Thank you for having me.”
“Can you tell the folks in the audience a...

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“Air becomes wind when it’s agitated.” Lucretius

“Thank you for joining me in the studio today,” Mr. Zephyr. 
“Glad to be here, Bob. Thank you for having me.”
“Can you tell the folks in the audience a...

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So many, maybe millions
No, billions. Trillions?
Of stars, a quiet, hot snowfall
of white stars; sandal season squall.
Each birch tree here outdoing 
January's record accumulation.

Weeks of hour after hour after hour
upon day upon day upon day of
birches'...

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Rumi Verse: The universe is not outside of you. Look inside yourself, everything that you want you already are.
             ______________________________________

Phenotype-inherited flaw chimera
fantasy flurry...

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I was a happy, fluent linguist, fruitfully helping revive endangered languages,
As colorful rainbows walk across the sky, in buttery hours, turned languorous.

I enjoyed doing practical fieldwork, and establishing useful literary programs,
As the honeysuckle sun loves...

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which prime mate affectionately called buttock blaster
alimentary explosion ofttimes causes global disaster
upon such gaseous debacle run for your life ever faster!

Yours truly (humorously dry husband)
can definitively attest,
she (thee missus) nixed, ordained,
inured, espoused blessed
discrete frolicsome liaisons...

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Mine Mean Mien, Hence Deserved Cross To Bare

Upon reflection of fatherhood,
onset of hands-on schooling 
fraught with narcissism
a role I lept in unaware 
with slim success
unknowingly portending how fatuous

frolics spelled ultimate doom
with theoretical strings attached,
when snagged,...

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With a wag of tail and tongue bedraggled
dogs drag their owners to frolic off-leash
in parks devoted to dog meets dog dalliance and play.

Despite their authority, the owners know each
not by the owner’s names, but by...

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Filched Physiognomy – Mine revisited!

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...

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Idyllic reverie during break of day

May today bring unbridled bliss 
delivered courtesy sunshine kissed
giving Midas a run for his money.

When the last trace of night 
evaporates analogous to milky hue,
whereat a dreamy state 
pervades thy...

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the footing on the flanks of the Hill of Beans
was worse than he had sussed
that drizzling pale morning
when the Sun was lowest
but beans be damned
and their counters with them
yes I know
a smoky mess
like most of...

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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...

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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...

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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...

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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...

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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...

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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...

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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...

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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...

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