Long Flooding Poems

Snapshots
by Michael R. Burch

Here I scrawl extravagant rainbows.
And there you go, skipping your way to school.
And here we are, drifting apart
like untethered balloons.

Here I am, creating "art,"
chanting in shadows,
pale as the crinoline moon,
ignoring your face.

There...

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Sonnets XLII-LI

Distances
by Michael R. Burch

Moonbeams on water?
the reflected light
of a halcyon star
now drowning in night...
So your memories are.

Footprints on beaches
now flooding with water;
the small, broken ribcage
of some primitive slaughter...
So near, yet so far.



A Surfeit of...

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As I slept in isolation
my desired beloved appeared to me; 
therefore, dreams have become my reality
and consolation. 
—Ono no Komachi, translation by Michael R. Burch

Submit to you—is that what you advise? 
The way the ripples...

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Rejection Slips

With over 5,700 publications if I count poems that have gone viral, I suppose I shouldn’t complain … but I do have some poems that have never been accepted for publication. Here are a...

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Last half of Edward de Bono's Lateral Thinking Summary, pp. 298-300, with bicameral ecological supplements [informed by Gregory Bateson] in brackets:

In ordinary traditional thinking we have developed no methods for going beyond the [suboptimally reasonable]...

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The weight of the water is heavy in my chest, a force pressing against the ribs. It rises when I don’t expect it, like a flood breaking through cracked, neglected seams. The truck of my...

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Once upon a time there was a castle made of pure ivory. Pillars pale and barren, holding a surface of grace and elegance. This castle was the home of a mighty unicorn named Stardust. She...

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     by how many badbyes can you measure the length of your day

                 first comes...

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Upon this date he spoke no more of the preceding moments, 
Tearing and hurling insult upon insult
In several directions, his tongue whipped and scorched me,
And he waited relentlessly to see the spark in my eyes...

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I live in America, as in the United States of America, and that used to mean something. At least to me it did. And it’s not so much in how I was raised but in...

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After Bréagán left the courtyard Erlenkönig began his own preparations for the upcoming fight.  He did not have time to think of the elf's self apprehension.  He knew that because of the chiding...

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Swept up into piles; everywhere 
Abouts; in collected heaps all 
Around.               
It is almost as if the drab 
Streets were strewn...

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Huge fluffy clouds began to form over 
Sanibel Island as the salted gulf splashed 
against the rocks around the lighthouse 
coastal waters rose up as a calming coolness 
carried this gentle warm breeze over to...

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Human history is difficult;
hard pressed,
discovering
and rediscovering,
connecting
and reconnecting feelings
about therapeutic needs
and sacred wants
for trauma-prevention peace
trust
joy

Through co-empathic singing passions
which may,
too often, 
feel stressful

Irritating
depressing
stormy
before unconditional win/win regard
for Self AND Other
reconnect,

Like EgoTheistic re-ligion
and EcoMatrimonial
indigenously multicultural
ecowomanist wisdom

Of Ego/EarthTribe mutual MeWe...

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My receptive wide adoring eyes rested within the ambient light and bathed in The Shadoe and shade of the scene
Where before me a paragon of sublime refined  beauty 
So sensually seductively and arousingly delightful...

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The half elf watched as Lumi spoke with Chroí; then, in the center of the circle the soil began to move and from it appeared the Garden Elf.  He said nothing, he never spoke....

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When the StraightWhite Patriarchal President
sent out his Praise and Thanks Message
"We love you"
to those who would cathartically enjoy beheading
VicePresident St. Peter's Pence 
loves homophobic St. Paul,

This felt like too much tolerating
an unconstitutional intolerable
absence of basic...

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“Are there many Fairy Folk other than the elves?”  Joulupukki queried.
     “Not so many as before the humans took control of the world.  The ones left behind in Erin...

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Something that stuns me from revelations awakening 
All good people of the world see you Isis 
clearly diamond cut your scale tips heavy 
with the wealth that's stolen from foreign lands 
to build weapons of...

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The flames of the furnace (well-travelled by wind
slowly glazing the rags of gray women chagrined
at the sight of a hair fleeing tresses now thinned) 
sometimes billow like waves flooding naves through the night,
when the lightning...

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I need some natural,
organic,
spacious kinda time.
Where is nature in this time,
my time,
our time?

Perhaps nature is to time
as solid forms are to flowing recreation,
as body solidarity is to mind creativity,
as Yang is to Yin,
as Full-Blown Climaxing...

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Being Bob

Bob, is just an ordinary guy in every sense of the word. Five ft eight inches tall, a little on the chubby side and has lost most of his hair. No one pays much...

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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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I.
You can always tell by the eyes
When they’re starting to go
You’ll fall for a few of their lies
Before you begin to know
And you will just defy it
(But they know you will never go)

They’ll glide through...

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In the May-time of my life
time bloomed each day a prickly boll –
but I, like the softest cotton within such a sharp seed  
swaddled in the purity of security 
for what seemed like eternity...

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