Long Flair Poems

On an early morning just before school
My tummy is churning my head hurts too
My feet are cold my forehead is hot
I have a runny nose and a tongue with blue dots

“Mom come quick!” I helplessly...

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It may have been the devil himself who prompted the kids in my schoolyard back in 1947 to chant "Patsy Foley's roly-poly from eating too much ravioli."

At first, no one could remember who started the...

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Poems about Poems IV

The Toast
by Michael R. Burch

For longings warmed by tepid suns
(brief lusts that animated clay),
for passions wilted at the bud
and skies grown desolate and gray,
for stars that fell from tinseled heights
and mountains bleak...

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Once upon a weedy lawn
At Cedar Oaks Retirement Home
There sat my mother, weak and old
On an afghan knit to block the cold.

It was summer, but in mom's grey eyes
Was winter, when all around us dies.
I...

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NAME: Phil Latio.

QUALIFICATIONS: LLB (Law) PhD (Medicine) & FSC (Federation Starfleet    
                    ...

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Old Pharaoh had enslaved the Jews; he would not let them go.
So God devised a mighty scheme; his go-to guy was Mo.
His brother Aaron was the voice, for Moses talked real slow,
So he would wave...

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Eric Mottram on the American literary and cultural scene during 1965-66 while he was the recipient of the American Learned Societies’ award for a year. (begun in the last post and to be continued)

January 2,...

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New Year Poetry

Auld Lange Syne
by Robert Burns
translation by Michael R. Burch 

Should old acquaintance be forgot,
And never brought to mind?
Should old acquaintance be forgot,
And days for which we pine?

For times we shared, my darling,
Days passed,...

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Poetic Encryption Like Ancient Egyptian

This terror and threat to poetic clarity,
Becomes a pet rock for some poets.

Words do count for sure, but so does
Clarity unless poets put a mask on.

Encryption can be used to mask...

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Long in the tooth male doth recount, reflect, reimagine...
his woebegone damn dental daze today May 5th, 2021 

No particular rhyme nor reason
garden variety indentured flunky (me)
revisits his salmagundi salad days, 
when oral blight smote 
left...

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They came from as far a way as New York and Dallas Texas. The class of 1981 wasn't a large class, it was the very first class of a very very private school. Their school,...

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Written in summer of 1976.


I used to eat my lunch with groups
of businessmen from Campbell Soups.

We drank a drink at lunch each day
Of Coca-Cola mixed with hay

And talked of pending corporate plans
And willow-haired orangutans.

I spent...

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Now in my time echoes
  I remember then
  my full days in a life
  when I was ten.
We lived in a shadow 
  much greater 
  at the gates of...

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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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Voices of creation speak Type A and Type B,
and polyglot dialects through Z, 
somehow under what lies in shadow
from B through Z

Anyway, Type A conscious I am alive
in this indoor moment
awake but not directly sun-absorbing...

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PART 1:          THE MEETING

Alone one night neath lantern light, I trudged a weary mile.
Forlorn, I went with shoulders bent (the storms around me howled)
until I met...

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Sunday February 2nd, 2025 Groundhog Day

Location: Gobbler's Knob in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. First held on February 2, 1887 prognosticating how many more weeks of winter weather without a shadow of a doubt. Aforementioned site chosen for...

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Onerous task confronted teachers and parents

As prospective students
ably ready themselves to matriculate
and/or first set little feet 
inside halls of learning,
I rebroadcast a poem crafted
at the height of Covid-19.

A couple years gone back educators
adaptation regarding coronavirus...

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Step right up, buy your ticket, wait in anticipation to see the show, the one beneath the tent that holds all the dreams I never wanted to be exposed
But now it’s time, I must share...

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The time was 11:05. Damian 
Made the essential announcement 
"HAKIM the time is now 11:05
We will leave this place at 11:15am.
That's 10 minutes from now.
So use the toilet, do everything 
You need to do for...

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The Lay of The Best Man - Part Two


I will not understate my distaste, but I do not hate. I rate hate as being irate
Shall I underrate the spate of your hate as you devastate;...

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Zacchaeus' climb up to success, 
                             A...

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Through Their Eyes

The Poetry Murders Part 3 in the series

Murder She Wrote

It was a dark night with a full moon
The alley narrow, my hopes high
My footsteps echoed in the ears of the invisible
I quicken my...

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Whar art thou dame of my dream?

Eagerness readily overtakes me prior 
to succumbing to nightly slumber. 

Tis boot a blink when eyelids become relaxed 
adrift abed invariably occurs counting backwards  
from one hundred –...

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I’m going cray-cray some say…crazy in love, baby…
But, hey, I’m feeling fine up in here
Boldness and bravery today…went through me…
Shedded a tear with no fear…fear…
I’m corny and punny all in one
I’m the sun that shines…much...

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