Long Locker 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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Salvation of a Formalist, an Ode to Entropy
by Michael R. Burch

Entropy?
God's universal decree
That I get to be
Disorderly?
Suddenly
My erstwhile boxed-in verse is free?
Wheeeeee!



Eternal Currents
by Michael R. Burch

How can I write and not be true
to the rhythm...

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As to the this and the that and the how and the why,
    I pass no judgement on the tale at hand.
And leave it to scribes to much later decide
  ...

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Toddlers' Exploration: 

Cardboard drum, a thunderous beast,
Playful roars in tiny fists and feasts.
Fleeting wings glide, dreams just out of reach,
Soaring through tales of barnyard Waddles and Squeaks,
Moo! Quack! Giggles tumble and bump.
Flaps flapping, bright colors...

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Don't you think that this title is darkly divine?
But, of course, there will have to be weirdness that’s funny,
Though my nightmares are many and have complex arcs
There’s some risk here I might have to work...

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Fifty years, boy and man, I’ve been a Sooners fan;
And watched thousands of recruits try to make my Sooners Team.
Often, I’ve enviously wondered what it must be like
To be a touted Sooners recruit, living out...

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I have to admit
The school where I work
Needs everyone to be
Able to speak Spanish.
Because the parents do.
We are an 82 percent
Spanish-speaking community.
I’ve taken Spanish 4 times.
And I have failed Spanish 4 times.
I have no idea...

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Lux Vitae Love Stories of The Fey:

“In the Clouds”



“What are you looking at Mum?”
“They come in the clouds you know”, she said to her daughter
“Every night, the same time, the numbers seem to grow,...

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Ah...Satisfactorily Succumbing Into Salubrious Sleep

Aye sandman, I surrender to yar supreme governance
surreal spectacular soiree gifts subconscious sphere
soothing (analogous to natural palliative), ah...REM
member nought, asper exquisite entertaining cerebral
kaleidoscope replete with nonpareil visual trappings

aesthetically tantalizing unforgettable..., but...

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The Job

I got a plane to catch in the morning.  8:15 AM out of Austin, destination Orange County, CA.  Never cared much for California and I don’t think anything about this trip is...

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A psalm to solemnize pure tin forefathers/mothers...

Who didst unknowingly, unquestionably, 
and unwittingly script vitality
and the prologue to Thanksgiving,
(which theme poem initially written)
about three hundred and ninety seven years, 
and nine months after February third 1621,
yet...

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I’m proud to contradict you, sir...your p***s makes you male...and males who claim they’re female are too often merely fools
That feign their - swap in gender - to compete in women’s sports...their goals:  to...

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Down deep beneath fathoms icy keep, where deadmen’s
Scream in utter silences aquatic hell, amongst the devils
Graveyard of wreckage's carnage, there exists a ghostly harbor
Of phantom ships!
Anchored are the souls of the undead, and vessels craft...

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Inevitable death defines afterlife - trois

So all I ask, would be
inviting, offering, and ushering me to 
top secret cygnet committee
to give this average sized 
chapped sticky man
spinning the david bowie playlist 
as a somber dee...

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A subtle numbness overtakes my senses. I feel a slight heavy weight fall upon me in the gentlest of ways, almost like you’re wearing a fur coat in a meat locker and someone’s pissing on...

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Doesn't matter what my name is. Certain types of men do certain types of things. Like join a terrorist group coz they believe they're right. I've been inside with them.     ...

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I already hear the Twittering Trumpers
and Trumpettes
in their unholy locker rooms
reducing the marching evolution of nurturing feminist matriarchs
to another whine,
too gooey,
shrill and screechy,
nagging nanny stroll away from True Patriarchal White Male empowerment.

Never minding Mother's ecological...

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Once upon a time in the lands from the north, south, east to west    
Navigating on the cold white sands formed of sugar and ice       ...

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Wordsmith's Veneration...

Methinks, I post literary endeavors inxs
but tis with blood, sweat and tears
in case ye did not guess,
who struggles to craft reasonable rhyme
ideally read by a pleasing poetess.

Aye willy nilly understate (trying to)
tantalize, hypnotize, galvanize...
with...

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The Dream

On it’s  final journey – destination – a coma –
realization, a stagnant pool of reflections,
images on fun house mirrors –
surrealistic paintings
upon the walls of times passing,
it’s life diminishing, slowly, upon wings
of a sorrowful,...

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"An X-Mess Carol"

Somewhere standing barefoot
in the sand, she thought with guilty pleasure
“This is the KORO SEA!” and
conjured up a multitude of story scenarios
Buccaneers, Pirates Parlay, Treasure Maps, 
Davy Jones Locker, Jack Sparrow, Ho’es
you know, those...

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The world is like a sea
The countries are mobile ships
When a great plague washes over
Not from scruby, but from corona.

The colonial ships take extreme measures
To keep their colonies safe and secure
By staying indoors to keep...

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These are the best sports poems by Michael R. Burch, Part II

The Locker
by Michael R. Burch

All the dull hollow clamor has died
and what was contained,
removed,
reproved
adulation or sentiment,
left with the pungent darkness
as remembered as the sudden...

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curt hissy Matthew Scott Harris
who wishes ewe well
to make $cents of the following
mumbo jumbo lettered gumbo.

Hip puck crease see
(ad hoc) key hide dee claim
haint how my noggin 
comports itself to take aim,
cuz ear lee aire...

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Staring down at the pavement beneath my feet, 
shoelace has loosen from the knot on my left shoe; 
draping close to my ankle, as it pauses on the floor. 
Gritty, re-cemented road, older than the...

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