Long Lanterns Poems

"Oak" 

The guardians
stood around and 
shook their heads

great thoughts 
quivering 
from the ground, roots up, 

as if to walk 
confidently 
with great armies

yet hesitation 
was witnessed
in their waving gestures

perplexed 
and touching 
green crowns, 

there they...

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Poems about Poems V

Distances
by Michael R. Burch

There is a small cleanness about her,
as though she has always just been washed,
and there is a dull obedience to convention
in her accommodating slenderness
as she feints at her salad.

She...

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“le livre bleu” 

Terabytes.
lonely poets, writers, 
musicians and artists play here,
they wear masks that cover
vermillion dripping smiles
over sharp little wolverine teeth,
they drown their sorrows in their muses -
contemporary little monsters – Still Life, 
they call...

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The excitement mounted as we rummaged around in the attic looking through old steamer trunks for discarded clothes and props to make Halloween costumes. With an old suit and hat of Granddads, I became a...

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He just appeared to me, like wispily curling 
Chimney smoke, 
One grim and early morning in the very midst of 
Decembers briefest days, on the highest slope,
Toiling through my daily round; where, slowly 
Driving up...

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When I was young, and adventure routine,
With excitement and newness still unforeseen
I was eager to spread my wings to the world
And seek more adventures as those wings unfurled

Within my long travels I happened to meet
Two...

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A born lioness my untamed heart? ha! 
a mouse, this pulsing token ruled by unruly wants
at times given, traded or stolen - sometimes
thrown down on a dare to be won or lost 
till it became...

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These are poems about starlight and moonlight, moons and stars, dreams and visions, illuminations and intimations …



Will There Be Starlight
by Michael R. Burch 

Will there be starlight
tonight
while she gathers
damask
and lilac
and sweet-scented heathers?

And will she find...

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Contend with me while you can 
Contend with me and I will deliver the master plan
Contend with me and I will make you smile
We have been through worse than this
And we have always rise up...

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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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How much I longed for the days
When the earth will rise to its glory again
How much I longed for the days
When we will give God all the praise
The earth‘s sadness will fade away
And we will...

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"What a fine day for a picnic," my friends all said,
In the dog days of summer, with the hot sun overhead.

We would all go for a swim, and then have a fine lunch,
And would return...

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...the village shivers   a hive of restless souls
skin pricklin' with anticipation
as costumed runners fixin' to gather — hearts a-thrummin'
              ...

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Our lives and our time
Fired useless
Into the air
Toy cap gun shots
Those winter palaces unstormed
No tax offices ransacked
Where is utopia I asked
And no-one knew
They looked at me with pity
As if I still talked
To an imaginary friend
At...

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The Eiffel Tower (La Tour Eiffel)

‘Iron Lady,’ of sensual beauty in the ‘City of Light:’
(La Dame De Fer: Bienvenue a Paris, France!)

Built to be the world’s tallest structure at 300 meters,
As the gateway entrance to...

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In the deep spiked pine forests

On a walk you forgot you took

Snow up your knees

Twenty feet away

An enormous old house

Not abandoned, smoke from the chimney

Large windows, dark wood walls

A forest castle here for you 

To explore...

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Tell her you saw me ...

Tell her I was out on the bluff at the Cape
during a gale, much too close to the rocks.
Tell her the surf was tormenting the ledges,
its roar far too loud...

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tell her you saw me ...

tell her I was out on the bluff at the Cape during a gale, much too close to the rocks … tell her the surf was tormenting the ledges, its...

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“Words We Cannot Escape”

Words we can no longer speak

we tap dance over keys 
bruised blackly numb
Winter palette in hand 
Autumn now gone 

across white-washed notes fixated on stark enclosed walls 
the scent of old Lavender...

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(A lone voice writes)

Some whisper and will
In secret occult circles 

About these sad days of 2025

That Humanity will fall into unruly petulant desire

Consumed and devoured by a blazing war lit infectious fire 

But what happens...

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Meet me at the square
That is what I continue to hear
Meet me at the square before the close of the year
I know that your calendar is full
But create an extra page for me
So that we...

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Final Wishes of a Poet 
Arabic poem By: Rukn-al-Din Yunus
Translated into English By: 
Inaam Al-Hashimi (Gold_N_Silk)
========================
(Part 1 of 3)

Lend me a handful of earth
So that I may make you a statue 
You have not seen...

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Self-Addressed Stamped Envelope

Horrid tin on wet paper. Coastal fragments of an empire twilight. Nonsense to corners in a deck along the warped cabin. Would you be silent for a moment? Afraid it seems, all these...

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~Today We Are In Love~


We are in love since 43 years: 
Today we know how to get back to the way we used to be 
by removing our internal bleedings.
Love today as it is a...

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Taming a tropical topical tree? Taking a trunk? Telling a tailor? Traversing a tale? Many ideas. Much like the ideological dramas of a beach front. Wavelength of winds. Movements if the tides. Coconuts can jump...

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