Long Marsh Poems

I Know The Truth
by Marina Tsvetaeva
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

I know the truth?abandon lesser truths!
There's no need for anyone living to struggle!
See? Evening falls, night quickly descends!
So why the useless disputes?generals, poets, lovers?

The wind...

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Come Down
by Michael R. Burch

for Harold Bloom

Come down, O, come down
from your high mountain tower.
How coldly the wind blows,
how late this chill hour ...

and I cannot wait
for a meteor shower
to show you the time
must be...

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What Good Are Our Tears?
by Michael R. Burch

What good are our tears?
They will not spare the dying their anguish.
What good is our concern
to a child sick of living, waiting to perish?

What good, the warm benevolence...

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THIS WORLD OF DEW

This world? 
Moonlit dew
flicked from a crane's bill.
—Eihei Dogen Kigen, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Seventy-one?
How long
can a dewdrop last? 
—Eihei Dogen Kigen, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Dewdrops beading grass-blades
die before...

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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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In sandy Egypt lived three men
In ancient days when pharaohs reigned
The kingdom of the pyramids,
Osiris and that Isis’ den,
Whom everyone worships and heeds,
Or at least doing so they feigned,
And those gods too blessed them and...

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I tell, to follow, that long trait before
We reached the  back foot of the tower tall,
Our eyes went up to the top core

For two little flames we saw install,
And another responding from so far
That...

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Our lusty voice was in the tramp of narrow, winding,
     Scree-littered, deep-rutted roads;     
 Ravens, uttering guttural croaks, slow-wheeling above      
 ...

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Love has a Southern flavor: honeydew,
ripe cantaloupe, the honeysuckle’s spout
we tilt to basking faces to breathe out
the ordinary, and inhale perfume ...

Love’s Dixieland-rambunctious: tangled vines,
wild clematis, the gold-brocaded leaves
that will not keep their order in...

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Within the frame a sepia scene
a dusty porch   a rickety chair   
the fabric of your dusky face creased
with ceaseless sunbaked woes
your old pair of getaway feet gives 
a different walk of...

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This is a Crown of Sonnets I wrote about one of my favorite books and movies (the version in 1943 with Liz Taylor, who was only 11 had a small role, Joan Fontaine and Orson...

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"Conceits"



Such conceits
as veils between 
our windowed worlds 
torn torrential incomplete

mayst thou watch and learn 
the one I spawned, 
strength beats weakness
carried soft and harsh

one direction or the other
strength and weakness
both carried soft and harsh
ego and...

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FIRST MOVEMENT (Minor Key)

Times such as these test body soul and mind
So should our thoughts be pain and dark confined
Or loosed to concentrate on brighter things
Like furry puppies, flowers and girls on swings

In this bright...

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So, I’ll be quite frank about how I feel…
Dealing with my demons, made out of steel
And I have been feeling numb all my life
Due to a lack of peace…dealt with hellfire strife

I don’t mean to...

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Sometimes faith lives on the edge of a knife
as Sviastoslav the Rus sacker came to know 
The Khazar Khanate knew how to cut a slight
his gilded skull stole the show,
The Vatican went from a marsh...

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Achilles, His Heart and Soul Were Mortal
Part One- (Years Before Troy)

Achilles* woke, his slain foes calling out his name
hearing merciless woes, his sharpen sword they blame
looking at the heavens he saw the moon glowing blood...

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They said that over the years I've killed ten people, and 
they said that with conviction as if it was a fact
I think in secrecy and with a conviction that it was more than that.

They...

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I've drove along this road before
And thought I knew it well
Every twist and turn it made
The marsh, the mounds, the dell

But on this autumn evening 
I felt like I was lost
I did not recognize this...

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In recent years I had grown so forgetful, like noon without memory of night.
I forgot special events and sundry items, like books, my phone, or flashlight.

It was turning into a frightful nuisance, like long shadows...

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LOST IN BRITAIN

Poling, Patching, Nether Wallop, 
Matching Tye and Droop

Plumpton, Lickfold, Puddletown, 
Westward Ho! and Throop.

Hole of Horcum, New Invention,
Boghead, Frome, Cat's Ash

North Piddle, Staines and Pen*stone,
Wash Dyke, East Breast and Flash.

Six Mile Bottom, Mudford...

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I had always loved being near deep-sea water, and I was never too far away,
As the beauty of fresher tomorrow, is but mystic hours from prevalent today.

I enjoyed swimming and boating and surfing, and even...

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The late night storm rushed into the valley,
Pouring down, 
Creating the sleepy ambiance only a mountains lull can provide.  
The crisp damp air crackles to life at lights first caste over the mountain,
into the...

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Even the Lazy Lizard

Even the lazy lizard knows when not to beg,
when not to emerge, from behind the hungry black rock of 
another dying hand, hopelessly clutching the mysteries of 
another sit-down, in the serene...

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Turtle by the Door


The bears and wolves are few;
one threadbare widow mourning,
two grays as consumptive as smoke.
The large dwindle,
their bodies grow more awkward,
more at odds.
The heavier beasts sway
like drunks in the scant woods.
Under a pelting...

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A journeyman once spelunked in a cavern beneath a marsh,
Whose oily layers of algae and water made his mission harsh.

For the cavern's entrance stood in the middle of the massive swamp
Full of gators with sawtooth...

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