Long Needless Poems

Limericks III - Grab Bag

Being a peace activist, I once wrote a limerick in an attempt to stop needless wars:

Of Tetley’s and V-2's
(or "Why Not to Bomb the Brits")
by Michael R. Burch

The English are very...

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Medieval Poems

How Long the Night
anonymous Middle English lyric, circa early 13th century AD
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

It is pleasant, indeed, while the summer lasts
with the mild pheasants' song ...
but now I feel the northern...

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Rejection
a roundel by Geoffrey Chaucer
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Your beauty from your heart has so erased
Pity, that it's useless to complain;
For Pride now holds your mercy by a chain.

I'm guiltless, yet my sentence has...

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Rondels, Roundels and Rondeaux

These are poetic forms similar to villanelles, with refrains (repeated lines) and sometimes double refrains.



Rondel: Merciles Beaute ("Merciless Beauty")
by Geoffrey Chaucer
loose translation/interpretation Michael R. Burch

Your eyes slay me suddenly;
their beauty I cannot...

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Where do we come in
					in medias res  not knowing nor caring when
doesn’t everybody pine being number one we leave behind our lives in pages  pictures  or else make for images of what...

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MY Collaboration with Ricky Nelson in the Last Days of 1980

The eventful news of that day about what was found on board that crashed plane, won't replace that particular memory of Mr. Rick Nelson's hearty...

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Grandma died when I was 18 years old, on Christmas day. I never really got to know her well, since the family had pretty much kept their distance from her due to her 'weird religion.'...

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C. T. Myers


Just a couple weeks ago the boss called in an ad, hoping we could find a guy to fill Bill Daly’s shoes.
Bill had fallen victim to the same thing that his dad had,...

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Evolution Not God

It is the case that there is no God,
He does not exist, he is not the one,
He is not there, he’s not everyone’s invisible puppet,
It is not personal, he is not the Son.

Evolution...

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Thirty years ago, long before ISIS started executing Kurds, Muslims and Christians, I hired a Pakistani Muslim as an art director in Chicago. I was an Irish Catholic editor putting out a small national magazine....

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Preparations for 'Luau' (LOU-ow) or a Hawaiian Party-like event, for a church Luau, would be a 'Ho'ike' (hoe-'E-kay). The hunters will tie the hind legs of whatever animal will go into an 'i'mu' (E'-moo), which...

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Legend has it that six hundred years ago, lived a creature of the wild. His name was Talos. He held the strength of a bear yet wore the coat of a fox. He was deep...

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Incredible! Where could little girl of her age be going under this cold weather at this hour barefootedly and bareheadedly?What could have sent a poor girl she was to street with just oversized slippers she...

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This is, as indicated, the 1st HALF of this fairly lengthy poem. The 2nd half had to be posted separately due to Poetry Soup's file-size limitations. No other way I could manage to make it...

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Sixty-eight and Sixty-nine
By Franklin Price
02/03/2022

In January sixty-eight, I was sent to Vietnam,
Was no internet back then, no Facebook, only Spam
I went to serve my country. Had signed the line in sixty-five
Going there to do my...

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Gaylord Laryngitis was a monstrous human being.    
They say he weighed…at ten years old…at least 400 pounds,
But standin’ 6 foot 7…and because he exercised…
he actually didn’t look real “fat”…despite the way it...

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Whatever Happened To Glasnost And Perestroika?

Hobbit those characters who lived 
within the realm 
of John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
as far removed as
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
upon squelched cusp of progressivism,
now most likely 
experience bitterness at the...

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There stood a castle on the summit of a hill
Now fallen to decay, hidden among bushes wild
It perched like an eagle’s nest on the steep hill
It was owned by a Lord, gentle and mild

Blessed with...

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The New Man, a Human being in transition.

The New Man is not a softie but knows the healing, creative power of vulnerability, how to melt and let his heart be touched. 

He knows how to...

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A dawning twilight's me. Oh, joy. Oh, what a joy. This day. Oh, what a day. A breath bestills my eyes and I, e'er slight, a deeper breath that reopened them and myself to a...

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by Spencer Dillenbeck, my son, age 19:

A chunk of clay settling into its mold
A painting yet to dry
A matching hand I cannot hold
A block of cheese before its mold
But even I do not know why
The...

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Dragon visited the famous ‘Stones of Dragon’ at our Mayhem Falls Cave.
Hundreds come every year to see them, found here, in this hollowed enclave.
Dragon runes upon their face, they remained from a very ancient time...

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CORRUPTION
by
JOHN M. ARRIBAS


Now that I’m approaching the final inning
I need to re assess the ideas I had at the beginning
I thought that if you were altruistic and right
That alone was the strength needed to fight
To...

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Tears, softly falling,
Grieving for the dreams,
Beyond knowing,
Dreams, silent, growing,
Within the spirit,
Where Jesus love is flowing,
In frequent gestures,
Wise and everlasting,
Stirring the light that lives,
Because His love restores,
His grace, in a moment,
Brings more joy than a heart,
Can...

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The enemy draws near
I will not shed any tears,
For I'm stronger than fear
My cup is filled with cheers

The ugly beauty inside me will see me through
This shame and calamity that ended up in rue
The ugly...

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