Long Grimy Poems

No Mark
by Michael R. Burch

A wave implodes, 
impaled upon
impassive rocks...

this evening
the thunder of the sea
is a wild music filling my ear...

you are leaving
and the ungrieving
winds demur...

telling me
that nothing returns
as it was before...

here where you have...

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Sonnets LII-LX

The Endeavors of Lips
by Michael R. Burch

How sweet the endeavors of lips: to speak
of the heights of those pleasures which left us weak
in love’s strangely lit beds, where the cold springs creak:
for there is...

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LOVE POEMS V

These are love poems by Michael R. Burch, about life, the dream of love, virtue, a first kiss, a first crush, the birth of a first relationship, the joy of a first love...

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Pellucid pachyderms wade across
the purpling River Manjees
and Tozzath watches from the bank, 
the seat of his maroon pantaloons soaked with mud,
his nostrils flaring with the fragrance of ombadalias,
whose lacey petals flutter
like the wings of long-dead...

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My hair bristled in the crisp breeze
Excitement spreading throughout my body
Even the sudden cold amused my fingertips,
Tingles spreading through my hands and up my arms
Soon I would be there too. . .
In the murky shadows...

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This is, as indicated, the 2nd HALF of this fairly lengthy poem. Due to Poetry Soup's file-size limitations, this piece had to be posted in 2 parts. 
   The 1st HALF can be...

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And the music began,
And with power so strong, I nearly fell back from the force
Snarling, smiling, demons held me upright,
As the Precarious Prince began,

“Dare you in silence come to me, Daughter of Eve,
To challenge my...

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Interview with The Most Beautiful Suicide -Evelyn Francis McHale - May 1, 1947

So Evelyn, yours is one of the most famous of suicides, since you chose to jump from the Empire State Building in 1947,...

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I am just finishing my morning meditation when I hear my doorbell ring. It actually sounds more like that buzzing sound you hear if you fry a fat fly on one of those electronic bug...

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You hand me a rainbow rose
And you peck my red nose
You wished me a farewell with a sunlit glee I can't forget
I can't recall the times we spent in bliss...I only remember those days of...

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the grace of Paris
lingering in my thoughts. . . 
Madrid’s grimy walls

As our small group of students entered Madrid, it was an early morning in late January. We had left behind us what has been...

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A whirl, a gust, and a thunderous boom commenced,
Heartened by the latter soreness of silent night,
Shackled through the chill blows above,
A tempest, a storm,
Threshing the world,
Shaking the Prison of Plot,

The waters of the Holy Spirit...

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I

 
Take out the caked grimy faucet plug

Let those unseen crawlies dive and duck

                     ...

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See me through 
All I say or do is true 
I admit it - I am ashamed...
I am the one to be blamed 

For now, I'm the rueful, disdainful hue of blue 
Leave me be...

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I feel I am drowning
In open air,
Clawing at dirt that isn’t there
No one sees my distress—
No one really cares
Clacking, scraping sounds
Of glasses and plates
Echoes of breathing and voices
Assault my senses,
And still I cannot breathe…

Even as...

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I’m drenched in farewells…
I don’t know why 
You’re on my mind tonight…
Forever, 
I feel that my mind is giving in to 
Grief’s gravity
I saw the sun, 
Ascending from its resting haven, 
Hoping that it will...

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I remember yesterdays
                                ...

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Of Him and not me?
Muttered the dragon, full-formed, wretched, 
Stench unfathomable, seething and snarling
His great lungs expanding and exhaling puffs of darkness
Slanted, shining, scorching eyes burning into my own

What light shines but His own? 
Have...

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A stranger came arunnin through the village shoutin bout something in the forest that was killin the crops.  He was all excited and needed help gettin rid of the creature.  A big crowd...

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King Vlad Redux – Second Cold War

Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin’s grimy fingerprints on current history
are for him nothing to gloat about—au contraire I say emphatically:
His actions bespeak one who’s not an architect for peace—not at all,
rather...

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It's a fallacy that writers have to shut themselves up in their ivory towers to write. I have all these interruptions, three of which I gave birth to. If I was thrown for a loop...

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AKULA

Mark and I caught the last plane from Ft. Lauderdale to New Orleans to escape Hurricane Andrew, leaving Akula ,our boat, tied up at Rolly Shipyard to face the wrath alone. The next few hell...

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Brackish-gurgling days that
Unobtrusively slid along
Past tussock grass and curled up 
Balls of Fern...
Glued tightly onto structured vanes
Of outstretched frond.
Venerable Mosses reciting epic tales,
Measured throughout Metronomical 
Strains,
Chanting methodically in harmonious
Downturn - 
Wherein contained: 
Foreboding dialects delivered...

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Gazing down along the zealously
Monitored borders of well clipped
Evergreen Privet hedges.
Standing watchful guard over 
Divisions
Re-enforced by concrete posts and
Darkly stained, wooden, wavy-lap 
Fences;
Age-old neighbourly disputes, petty
Grudges and childish jealousies -
Ably demonstrated by various
Patchworks of shabbily...

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Did you hear my heartbeats like the soldiers, marchin’ on the notable night of March? It was thumpin’ with thunderin’ pride and victory once upon a time!  
Can you hear me echo my empathy...

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