Long Drear Poems

the Horror
by Michael R. Burch

the Horror lurks inside our closets
the Horror hides beneath our beds
the Horror hisses ancient curses
the Horror whispers in our heads

the Horror tells us Death is coming
the Horror tells us there’s no...

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These are prophetic poems and apocalyptic poems ...






Beast 666
by Michael R. Burch

“... what rough beast ... slouches toward Bethlehem to be born?”?W. B. Yeats

Brutality is a cross
wooden, blood-stained,
gas hissing, sibilant,
lungs gilled, deveined,
red flecks on a...

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Enough!
by Michael R. Burch

It’s not that I don’t want to die;
I shall be glad to go.
Enough of diabetes pie,
and eating sickly crow!
Enough of win and place and show.
Enough of endless woe!

Enough of suffering and vice!
I’ve...

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World War II Poems and Holocaust Poems - IV - Primo Levi

Shema
by Primo Levi
translation by Michael R. Burch

You who live secure
in your comfortable houses, 
who return each evening to find
warm food, 
welcoming faces...

consider whether this...

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With these lines I’ll relate an intriguing tale of dubious accuracy
For I Hope to unveil sordid affairs of more than one conspiracy!
Be warned, that though you might be disturbed by the facts I relate?
They are...

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An Excelente Balade of Charitie (“An Excellent Ballad of Charity”)
by Thomas Chatterton, age 17
modernization/translation by Michael R. Burch

As wroten bie the goode Prieste
Thomas Rowley 1464

In Virgynë the swelt'ring sun grew keen,
Then hot upon the meadows...

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"Ground Level Entry"

“She fits the bill”,
they say it 
insouciantly

visions of being 
carried in the beak 
of a bilious pelican 

where it builds
its rudimentary nest, 
it uses sticks and debris

no stones, yet,
from irreverence
thrown at it

no higher...

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Groundhog day 2024 or Forty one days since 2023 Winter Solstice

Rather than be a day late
and dollar short, I opted   
to post poem acknowledging
the second of February,
where eponymous groundhog
gets his (most often male)
foretelling...

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To a Mouse
by Robert Burns
translation/modernization/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Sleek, tiny, timorous, cowering beast,
Why’s such panic in your breast?
Why dash away, so quick, so rash,
In a frenzied flash
When I would be loath to run after you
With...

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Although I had always adored flowers, I had never had a green thumb;
And while I tried awfully hard, my efforts always had sorry outcomes.

Like the sorrow of old garden roses, during the unanticipated drought,
Or storms...

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I am in my newly adopted Green Sanctuary
enjoying our communal celebration
of all things nutritionally healthy

When the ecofeminist facilitator announces
it is now our time to light three candles of hope.

She invites our Greek chorus
to speak these...

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A man named Ben stood on a slope looking at the gates of hell,
He swore they’d never turn back, him and his best friend Del.
They knew the bandits came this way, they’d left a sloppy...

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I can understand Cowgirls
And some are real cows
But 'Cowboys'?
Shouldn't they be Bullboys?
Why did they call the chimp
On Tarzan 'Cheater'?
I wouldn't play cards
Did Williams Tell spill the beans?
If rabbits have holes? 
Can they be filled again?
So...

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Trusted (non Trumpeting) Flora And Fauna Emerge Out...
Of Hibernation To Rejoice Arrival Of Spring 2019

Accordingly, other than
meteorologists plenti schooled
ascertaining onset of temperate air
more particularly otter den non humans
unassumingly (ferreted out), who bear
the tidings, when that...

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There was an old lady, a frumpy old bag
who people called horrid, a witch and a hag
And 'though she was ugly and danced 'mid moonbeams
all was not quite as it might've then seemed

Old-fashioned black clothing...

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He never seemed to have the time for her
Responsibilities kept piling high
His days just seemed to fly in blinding whir
He could not sense her love was soon to die

So tired from his work, he'd lie...

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Of all old friends, those we have of old are best;
These the souls we travel with by preference,
Theirs the spirits to whom we grant all deference.
Their hopes are ours, and ours their own; 
All victories...

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Author’s Introduction - A word about Minot’s Ledge Lighthouse: 

The Minot’s Ledge lighthouse, built 1850, lying off the southeastern chop of 
Boston Bay, was the first lighthouse built in the U. S. that was not...

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It was only suppose to had been just an innocent friendship
at least in the beginning that how it started out to be,
I was confident in believing that I could actualy be friends with him
but at...

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I've been a bit free with the vitriol with a couple of poems recently, and need to check myself.  Some months ago I met a bard, Kevan Manwaring.  In his book, the Bardic...

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Neptune: 
I believe what I endowed the earth
with the swashing foreland when
the arogant waves strikes and take birth
of gentle ripples while flashing back
To the oceanic abyss, the sapphire peace. But
Where are you my marine fille?
Come...

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David Hurleys run away, he placed a sign just the other day.'
Closed till further notice I've heard.? It's beggars belief upon my word.'
I wonder if his door is round.? Like at bag end? And bolted...

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Beneath the River Somnium,
Abandoned Wishes hymn: quiet in the viaduct:

Reverse the Lodestone;
Reverse the First Sin;
Reverse the Autumn Hearse;
Reverse the Universe.

We are the murk men, intangible ends—inebriated together
With Beelzebub our friend. Absolvent now in burning skin,...

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Already noticeably marked
increase in daylight
yours truly courtesy affected
qua heliotropic phenomenon
finds me noggin gently being tugged
upward and westward ho toward sun
after dark mine talking head 
rests downward and eastward.

Soon very indistinct
environmental intimations 
regarding onomatopoeic
ubiquitous murmurings,
whereby old...

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The cliffs were very high in Euthyphro's dream ----

   so aloft they seemed many a mile of mystery upon mystery.....

   and cities of pillars and mighty pallisades, and ghost-mists

  ...

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