Long Inflame Poems

Sappho fragment #155
translation by Michael R. Burch 

A short revealing frock?
It's just my luck
your lips were made to mock!

*

Sappho fragment #156
translation by Michael R. Burch 

She keeps her scents
in a dressing-case.
And her sense?
In some undiscoverable...

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LOVE POEMS III by Michael R. Burch

These are love poems by Michael R. Burch about passion, desire, lust, sex, dating, relationships, devotion and marriage. 


Violets
by Michael R. Burch

Once, only once,
when the wind flicked your skirt
to...

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Sonnet LXXXI-LXXXIX

Day, and Night
by Michael R. Burch

The moon exposes pockmarked scars of craters;
her visage, veiled by willows, palely looms.
And we who rise each day to grind a living,
dream each scented night of such perfumes
as drew...

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If I Falter
by Michael R. Burch

for Beth

If I regret
fire in the sunset
exploding on the horizon,
then let me regret loving you.

If I forget
even for a moment
that you are the only one,
then let me forget that the...

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Hark and listen well, if those foretoken in the eyes of hungers lust
Trapped in their illusion, trampling the Stars into dust
Forced with the detestation stench by the swamp of absolute disgust
Thou blackest scorpion be accursed,...

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Regret
by Michael R. Burch

Regret,
a bitter
ache to bear . . .

once starlight
languished
in your hair . . .

a shining there
as brief
as rare.

Regret . . .
a pain
I chose to bear . . .

unleash
the torrent
of your hair . ....

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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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Disciples: How will we know True from False Prophets?

Teacher: You will cooperatively discern them
by their polyculturing love.

When does fear that disasters are becoming too relentlessly true,
masquerade as anger that such events and facts and trends
must...

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Original New Yorker Intents and Purposes

So who did you expect
to actually elect,
Vandana Shiva?

from Uniting Constitutions of MotherTrees

Tribes and groves
grow forests together
forming more therapeutically perfect Unions
of unity yin-flowing integrity,
not quite so much uniformity
of Yang's violating offensive...

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“Never forget 
everything Hitler did 
in Germany was legal.”
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

drop by drop lady liberty bleeds
red on white and blue
common sense vexatious 
verboten spins askew 

“We can and we must 
write in the...

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For those who agree that love is success
and hate is failure,
some admittedly unsolicited advice
from low-income and retired voter trenches:

1. Do not only run as AntiTrumpian.
Trumpianism means no more or less than
AntiPolycultural HealthyWealth
of and for Restoring...

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Juvenilia: Early Poems XIII

Davenport Tomorrow
by Michael R. Burch

Davenport tomorrow ...
all the trees stand stark-naked in the sun.

Now it is always summer
and the bees buzz in cesspools,
adapted to a new life.

There are no flowers,
but the weeds,...

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~Our Endured Love ~
                      
Today and yesterday I am who I am not asking...

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Every state is a verse, and America is a poem. 

         Can we still seek a ray of hope in the middle of vast gloom?
  ...

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POEMS ABOUT SHAKESPEARE by Michael R. Burch

Fleet Tweet: Apologies to Shakespeare
by Michael R. Burch

a tweet
by any other name
would be as fleet!



Fleet Tweet II: Further Apologies to Shakespeare
by Michael R. Burch

Remember, doggonit,
heroic verse crowns the Shakespearean...

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POEMS ABOUT POETS IX

Fleet Tweet: Apologies to Shakespeare
by Michael R. Burch

a tweet
by any other name
would be as fleet!
@mikerburch



Fleet Tweet II: Further Apologies to Shakespeare
by Michael R. Burch

Remember, doggonit,
heroic verse crowns the Shakespearean sonnet!
So if you...

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Sappho fragment 22
loose translation by Michael R. Burch 
 
That enticing girl's clinging dresses
leave me trembling, overcome by happiness,
as once, when I saw the Goddess in my prayers
eclipsing Cyprus.
 
NOTE: This is a translation of...

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My flag is not black n white with a blue streak 
My flag is not a field of white stars n scars of machine guns
My flag is not the fat face of a demagogue
Orange, pale,...

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Equal copyrights we can both claim
renown impossible mission to envision
just the experience to become linkedin
with literary talents of another motive
couched within these lines I exclaim
no idea regarding the specifics
how to kickstart joint effort game
undoubtedly enterprising...

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EARLY POEMS XIX

Bound
by Michael R. Burch

Now it is winter—the coldest night.
And as the light of the streetlamp casts strange shadows to the ground,
I have lost what I once found
in your arms.

Now it is winter—the coldest...

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she cowers in the corner 
when he comes home the 
mere clomp of the boots 
make their way to the room 
wherein she is hiding her
breathing rapidly increasing
her heart thumping louder
than his footsteps growing
closer while...

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Great White Father,

About those anti-BadNewsMedia rallies
while our SouthWest is burning
and while our SouthEast is flooding
and wet windstorm conflagrating,
feeling the flamed-up wrath
of an angry EarthGoddess,

Why do you plant and nurture hate
and anger
against potential WinWin integral communicators?

Did...

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Abort me not
What's the thought was I was brought 
Electrified turbulent sequences 
Triggers action imaginative 
Visionary dreams of scheme 
Abort me not
A way of things I am bothered electrified a promise 
Attilating spark a due...

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So mischievous was Aphrodite's dissonant minion of love
Instinct is discerning towards arrows released from above 

With a dishonest consideration to environmental influences 
	He pulled back his bow
Finger still wet from determining the wind's lingering effect...

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Years  of enduring passion have hastily passed
like each woman I briefly loved;
and all the images of beautiful days
bring back forgotten and faded memories...
ah, the foolish choices I made had little wisdom!
 

Sad heart full...

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