Long Palest 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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Juvenilia: Early Poems VI



An Illusion
by Michael R. Burch

The sky was as hushed as the breath of a bee
and the world was bathed in shades of palest gold
when I awoke.

She came to me with the sound...

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Poems about Butterflies and Bees



Flight
by Michael R. Burch

It is the nature of loveliness to vanish
as butterfly wings, batting against nothingness
seek transcendence...



Album
by Michael R. Burch

I caress them—trapped in brittle cellophane—
and I see how young they were,...

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Completing the Pattern
by Michael R. Burch

Walk with me now, among the transfixed dead
who kept life’s compact and who thus endure
harsh sentence here?among pink-petaled beds
and manicured green lawns. The sky’s azure,
pale blue once like their eyes,...

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Juvenilia: Early Poems by Michael R. Burch



Desdemona
by Michael R. Burch

Though you possessed the moon and stars,
you are bound to fate and wed to chance.
Your lips deny they crave a kiss;
your feet deny they ache to...

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A poet of a thousand words
The pen garnished by the flame
Like a sea no desire knows
And love becomes the same
As poet to my love for thee
I confess between the lace
Of time and every sorrow made
I...

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LETTER TO A SOLDIER
A Trilogy


I.  SONGS OF LOVE

Love walked with me
In the crisp fall air
In a shower of gold and red.
Love showed me the print
Of a doe’s foot
And where she made her bed.

Love sat...

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Time is like a shadow bright
 It fades and never can requite
 A lip, a shade, a palest kiss 
The sorrow that my heart did wish
 Clasped upon the rose and chain
 When fate cannot...

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"Dead Crush"



Oh uplift me woman
if we were to have a 
conversation would 
bees fly out of your mouth
or just mewling, simpering 
watered-down honey
not so pristine, just soft
and somewhat 
ingratiatingly tainted
you ply uplifting
romantic notions
like an air...

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Out on the the highway I was, in those apricot days of August.
I was returning from a vacation, and the birdsong was raucous.

My car had made the long journey, without any issues at all,
Like sun...

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Smoke rising from the ground
Obscures the pools of blood
Where soldiers uttering sounds
Lie dying in the mud.
Horses neighing, running scared
In horror find no end
Of battleground that's shared
The crimson life of men.
A bugle lies still tightly clenched
In...

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As a historian I was focused, on the long record of writing,
Considered an expert in the field, I found it most exciting.

For countless delights have arisen, out of the written word;
And we only knew crude...

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I was an artistic, floral designer, intoxicated by the sweet-smelling blooms,
Like magenta butterfly swarms, at a standstill, intoxicated by floral fumes.

Gold days were full of my bloom designs, each one so original and unique,
Just as...

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Past unconcerned hens that distractedly 
Scratch
Under frowning protestations from the
Sheltered Lee;
Into the cloaked shadows lain across the 
Cobbled courtyard,
Behind which squats the twisted form of
The old brooding, arthritic apple tree.
Past the neat little cow-byre 
Hosed...

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The Fisher
by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
translation by Michael R. Burch

The river swirled and rippled;
nearby an angler lay,
and watched his lure with a careless eye,
like any other day.
But as he watched in a strange half-dream,
he saw...

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Love in Kyiv
by Natalka Bilotserkivets
translation by Michael R. Burch

Love is more terrible in Kyiv
than spectacular Venetian passions,
than butterflies morphing into bright tapers–
winged caterpillars bursting aflame!

Here spring has lit the chestnuts, like candles,
and we have cheap...

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POEMS ABOUT SAINTS AND SINNERS

Of Seabound Saints and Promised Lands
by Michael R. Burch 

Judas sat on a wretched rock,
his head still sore from Satan’s gnawing.
Saint Brendan’s curragh caught his eye,
wildly geeing and hawing.

"I’m on parole...

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PETRARCH TRANSLATIONS

Sonnet XIV
by Petrarch
translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Lust, gluttony and idleness conspire
to banish every virtue from mankind, 
replaced by evil in his treacherous mind, 
thus robbing man of his Promethean fire, 
till his nature, overcome...

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It’s winter here, almost a painful grasp
grey dread, falling like melancholy
over the mountain peaks, gusts
flavored in sips of toasty coffee
lasting all afternoon
speaking to the twilight
winds, furious silence
pouring out gentle flakes, softly 
coloring the night in...

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I awaken to the woodland scent 
of a favored fragrant herb.

Its aroma transcends nocturnal bliss
and then softly seeks so gently to kiss
the distant lingerings in my mind.

Of a cherished place where I had laid
embraced warm...

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"Er, What's up, Doc?"
the doorman will say
his partner snickering behind
as you pass by the open doors 
into a hall of guitars and music posters
you peer into rooms with televisions 
or children playing with battery powered...

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My fingers grasp at the void, empty-handed...
My heart lingers at hollowness, emptied out...
reminiscent when time got wrinkled, worn
when night and day left,
and only nothing remained.

The embers of my burning words
 wither into the palest of...

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Where are you my sweet spring time,
I’m heart sink waiting for thee, oh beloved
Of all the seasons, thou ‘art my favorite,
For yours is the very breathe of life itself,
The Mystic Rose grows within your warmth,
Nourished...

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A warm sultry summers night, a silver crystal formed in
the corner of an eye. Trickled and rolled a gentle cheek,
fell to earth where all was dry. Whence it touched the 
ground did speak, an Orchid...

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O glorious Autumn of melancholic 
Gold -
All abouts the brightly lit
Woodlands
Your wonderful artistry behold!
Tinted bronzes,
Darting between awkward firs
Of sobering Evergreen,
Loiter inside mauve havens
Splashed with palest yellows -
And dappled with many differing 
Limes
Throughout this variegated Theme;
A...

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