Long Gather in Poems

Rejection Slips 2

The Shape of Mourning
by Michael R. Burch
 
The shape of mourning
is an oiled creel
shining with unuse,
 
the bolt of cold steel
on a locker
shielding memory,

the monthly penance
of flowers,
the annual wake,
 
the face in the...

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See
by Michael R. Burch

See how her hair has thinned: it doesn’t seem
like hair at all, but like the airy moult
of emus who outraced the wind and left
soft plumage in their wake. See how her eyes
are...

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Lozenge
by Michael R. Burch

When I was closest to love, it did not seem
real at all, but a thing of such tenuous sweetness
it might dissolve in my mouth
like a lozenge of sugar.

When I held you in...

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Poems about Things that Break II
 
These are poems about things that break and/or shatter.
 
 
 
Water and Gold
by Michael R. Burch
 
You came to me as rain breaks on the desert
when every flower...

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Prose Poems II
by Michael R. Burch

These are prose poems (is that an oxymoron?) and experimental poems...



briefling
by Michael R. Burch

manishatched, hopsintotheMix, cavorts, hassex (quick!, spawnanewBrood!); then, likeamayfly, he’s suddenly gone: plantfood.



bachelorhoodwinked
by Michael R. Burch

u are charming...

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Reducing sauces is a clever act that is not predetermined

Swimming in tepid waters often relieves tensions but a moose with a migraine prefers an ice cold bath. Bathing rituals signify statuses and this is referred...

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Nine times a fish tail is spun from thin yarn?

Swimming in tepid waters often relieves tensions but a moose with a migraine prefers an ice cold bath. Bathing rituals signify statuses and this is referred...

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Everybody moved out of the country to get a taste of the shining city
Ripe banana, ripe plums, are perishing in Uncle Sam’s broiling sun
I cannot stand the scorching heat that is swelling up from the...

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Date:  October   2051

Back at the main house Polly became reacquainted with everybody. Mama Lucinda entered from the path door. Recall their
Cool relationship Polly played her hand carefully. 
"Hello Misses Hakim. So happy...

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Femme Fatale By A Wishing Well 
  (In The Wastelands Of War)

Warm as breath on placid skin,
Soft as gentle summer rains,
Loud as natures angry clouds
That gather in ambushed lanes,
To confer with the wounded boys
Whose...

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I had no clue it was Valentine’s Day
Because no one said happy Valentine’s Day
I had no clue it was valentines’ Day
Because I had no one to share the Day
I ventured into another world
And drifted off...

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REVOLUTION
by
JOHN M. ARRIBAS


A revolution is much deeper than what the eye can see 
An opportunity to rid the land of despotism and tyranny
When any citizen can expose the enemies of the state
Present and judge valid...

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Dunce! You can’t spell cat
Dunce! You can’t spell rat
Dunce! You can’t spell dog
The mad man cries out in the street
Shaming and exposing big men and women.
And shouting expletives upon expletives.

X cloth, Z cloth blue cloth,...

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People say my personality is perky, many seem to find me intriguing;
And I greatly enjoy being popular, as I don't find society fatiguing.

Having traveled to myriad places, I have seen many beautiful sights,
Such as very...

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Medicine and sickness satisfy each other.
MotherEarth is medicine.
Where do you find yourself?
     Zen Master Yunmen
     China, 800s

Therapy and trauma require each other.
Ecological Earth is nature-spirit therapy.
Where and...

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Grandma Gretchen's in her rocker and she has something to say. 

She tells a visitor, a young man from the city, if he plans to write a book about life on a farm in the...

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"Tears, grief, memories and tributes of respect. "

                          ...

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The scent of musty, truly ancient fine books,
Waifs seductively behind the impossible doors, 
As they swing wide, out into L.A.’s balmy air,
I enter, a shiver, over what lies therefore.

There they are, the true Hollywood stars,
Scaling...

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(A lone voice whispers)

Like a lone argus-eyed oblique tattered caliginous silhouette

Moving extremely cautiously in the severe, deadly silence

The Mistress of the Voices of the Dead

Poe Ravenscroft Marmosett

A rare blatherskite whose white emblem appears on the...

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A dogged stance had made the beast retire
as disappointment filled the devil’s veins.
Though Brit resolve repulsed his hellish fire 
this demon’s air of pompousness remains.
His raging storm had faltered in the face 
of fierce resistance,...

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O Aphrodite,
Grecian fertility goddess
Matriarch idol of the womb,
your wise children love not reproducing
— Ancient Zion chant
heard in the echo chambers
of the caverns along the Aegean sea

Dwindling cries, dashed on the rocks
in luxurious maternity wards,
are slowly...

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They stroll through the garden of time with lots of synergy combined; hearts merges in one and passion walking hand in hand; summer burst through the trees and the temperature rage in the sea at...

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What is winter in Jamaica like?
When you were shivering the entire night
What is winter in Jamaica like? 
When you have no heating all night
Couples bundle up underneath the covers
Trying to keep each other warm
But the...

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I can still hear that voice speaking as if someone was dreaming, it is the voice that you hear when someone is trapped between mid-night and daylight and the sun comes charging at you and...

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When death had nestled, a lady overwhelmed by sleep,  
Between the chasms of my being, like a butterfly in a cocoon,  
I embraced her to my chest that whispered seraphic tales,  
And...

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