Long Muddied Poems

"Go on forth young graduates,

And show us who you are

You're now our future leaders

We know you will go far"

And so commencement ended

Pictures done and people changed

Now, off to private parties

All orderly pre-arranged

But four young girls...

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“Forever”



When The Terrors came,
The Uncontrollable Ones,
she closed her eyes
and listened for the notes
her mother had planted
amongst the deep blues,
beds of Forget-Me-Nots,
she followed the 
labyrinthine trail 
and through a gate unhinged,
it would seem destroyed, thrown aside,
she...

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Poems about Poems VI

The Board
by Michael R. Burch

Accessible rhyme is never good.
The penalty is understood?
soft titters from dark board rooms where
the businessmen paste on their hair
and, Walter Mitties, woo the Muse
with reprimands of Dr. Seuss.

The...

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Salve
by Michael R. Burch

for the victims and survivors of 9-11

The world is unsalvageable ...
but as we lie here
in bed
stricken to the heart by love
despite war’s
flickering images,

sometimes we still touch,

laughing, amazed,
that our flesh
does not despair
of love
as...

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“I thought about the former days, the years of long ago.” * 

If you saw something beautiful in a people, a place, a thing;
If you heard about something captivating and fantastic;
If you felt something soothing...

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“I thought about the former days, the years of long ago.” Psalms 77:5 NIV

If you saw something beautiful in a people, a place, a thing;
If you heard about something captivating and fantastic;
If you felt something...

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Continued from FREEZER MICE

The cat had travelled straight from hell, a hell beyond the stars
The cat that theories claim once levied genocide on Mars
She now seeks vengeance on descendants of the primal shrew
Whoever knew that...

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Almost a month now and the emotions honeymoon-surfaced fast
Plagued by the invasive thoughts of which one of us will prove to last
Anxiously waiting to see if our Jenga game will wobble, fall and crash
We're each...

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Troop ships loading, crowded docks
Mums and sisters waving off
Go with keepsakes, golden locks
Some men hug while many doff

Eric, soldier single stands
Beryl, lonesome widow cares
Many kissing holding hands
Eric stands and Beryl dares

Bump the soldier, make excuse
Apologizing...

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The monumental bane of OCD - obsessive compulsive disorder

As origin of Homo Sapien species surged ahead,
harboring nascent predominance
asper said primate reproductively bred,
(albeit via incremental fits and starts)
evolutionary forebears didst dread
Tom Tom Club former members
an American...

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In history one can read of an earlier time,
When poetry and lyrics written in rhyme,
Were commonplace.  A travelling band
Of troubadours would wander the land,
Writing and singing, to bestow delights
On ladies, peasants, and errant knights.

Their...

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"You’re It, The Secret"



Inside you
a whole new world

Outside 
You … exist

Outside
the game is ‘resist’

such an anxious world
the questions forever 

pressing on 
You

wanting answers
your gardens soiled and turned

new seeds for blooming
planted

your muddied waters
become in your mind...

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Walking from the horrid old motel, and out into the smaze, 
a suffocating day, worsened now, by a mocktail shade of smog
in mockumentary proportions, she flounders in a fog.
Too dazed by crazy sitcoms that seem...

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Long ago, before she was ever hunted by the beast,
She had only drank from the cool river of freedom.
One fateful day it happened; she was caught
unaware. Her body, suddenly foreign, to move was a struggle.
The...

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There is hope in every nation; for the word is going round
That Australians are sweeping fear away'

They are ardent freedom lovers, who are forged as hammered steel, and thery're gathering supporters
Night and day!

There are honest...

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"Here rise to life again, dead poetry!
Let it, O holy Muses, for I am yours,
And here Calliope, strike a higher key,
Accompanying my song with that sweet air
which made the wretched Magpies feel a blow
that turned...

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Tumbleweed Billy And One Eyed Sam

Banked off jagged hills, pushed on by memory
Cause and effect took turns churning the sidewinders
Tumbleweed Billy and One Eyed Sam (The patron Saint of snake eyes)
Dragged down from on high...

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`

I opened the rusted iron gateway
bound in chain and wire, to find a landing
caked in muddied footprints, scattered about like roaches
Magpie shadows course the rain soaked streets
and puddle patterns reflect temptation as light flickers
from second...

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What clears the thoughts of grief? 
Will it ever release me out if this confounded chamber of no relief?

With a sour taste of pride,
Your castle has been watered down
Will I ever find myself a thrilling bride?
My...

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DEAR SANTA, LET ME EXPLAIN


Dear Santa Claus, way up in the North Pole
Please, at least give me a chance to explain!
How was I supposed to know Dad’s remote control
Would get crushed when run over by...

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**~~**

She seemed to be like a delicate portrait
   which had fallen from its gilded frame 
Abandoned, lying face down on the cold winter floor
   An elegant portrait once painted
In resplendent hues...

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October: I'm eighteen, shortcutting home
through an autumn-burnished churchyard -
copper-lustred leaves, moss-skinned stone -
a jaunty swing of skater skirt and arm,
college folder square-sturdy in my hand.
In the moment. In the last pale pulse of sun.

Hey, can...

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The bluebird's nest
 
A mother bluebird sits on her eggs,
fretful and worried, looking for the dregs
Of the life that belonged to her.
And all was peaceful and all was right, in the bluebird's nest that night.
And...

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She seemed to be like a portrait...
   which had fallen from its gilded frame
Abandoned...
   Lying face down on the empty, cold wintry floor. 
An elegantly created portrait once painted in striking...

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TRAPPED

I run through life wounded with a steel jawed trap
ensnared onto my foot restricting my life’s essence.
Day in and day out I’m never able to shake it off,
 in relentless movements as fast as I...

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