Long Patched Poems

World War II Poems and Holocaust Poems V - Ber Horvitz, Yitzkhak Viner, Franta Bass

Der Himmel
"The Heavens"
by Ber Horvitz
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

These skies
are leaden, heavy, gray...
I long for a pair
of deep blue eyes....

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Film Noir

By the lampost at night
with the pale moon shining bright
but obscured by the fog
I saw her in the harbor
standing where my boat lay moored
but she knew that
her azure eyes beckoned me to come
smoke from...

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Film Noir

By the lamppost at night
with the pale moon shining bright
but obscured by the fog
I saw her in the harbor
standing where my boat lay moored
but she knew that
her azure eyes beckoned me to come
smoke from...

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Washed ashore on the lost island

Skin already peeling on the beach

Burning from the hot green summer sun

Meat melting off to become bone

Jumping back into the water

Cooling off with the clams and fish 

Washing the sand...

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This was last Saturday night. We were at a rooftop party in downtown New Haven thrown by ‘DocHouse.’ Doc-House is kind of a frat-house, owned by Dr. Melon, where he and seven doctoral students live....

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Pasha Acremodios grew greedy,
discontented with the domain he dominated,
so he turned covetous eyes toward Farabia,
sending his soldiers to seize this ripened plum

Spoiling for a fight and fighting for spoils,
his army swept across Farabia
like a bloody...

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O to tune in to good times of childhood—
To re-live gone-by years, not just to brood,
To lighten dust-laden baggage’s dead tare,
To unburden mind of deadwood afloat, 
To fast-forward to dusky days of old, 
To turn...

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SOLUTIONIST:
This is ANDERSON WALKINGSHOES... 
VERSE 1:
Drenched soul placed on a bench,
Avengers revenging not ready to repent;
Edge of grudges they always entrench,
Dreading of fate, that's what they depend.
Trends and hypes risen from their wrench;
Pitching and hitching...

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Midtone grey surrounds what’s left of a man’s soul
Scenes of biblical abominations troll
Inky are the hellish horizons appalled 
An okay is needed for anything at all 
Manipulating truth determines your life
Erasing individuality is part of...

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"It was heard
They took him to the morgue.
Last night in the February dark
When the crescent moon, five days toward full, had set
He'd had the urge to die."

In the artistic creation of poetry, there is a...

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Can you stack your chunks of memory, like me 
In tiered stacks of stories... free to see? 

Woven from far time to now, in soft open volumes bound 
Waiting for thoughts lost, but Wow... now...

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Placed Fist in:
Pick a Title, Vol 41 Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Edwrad Ibeh


                       ...

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One dark night a saucer crashed;
the military quickly cleaned up the trash.
In the distance, what they didn’t see;
a thin, white face between the trees.

Once all was quiet, little Gili-ok crept,
from the woods where he had...

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I have fallen, I believe I have been shot, not once, not twice, but several times.  I can hear them yelling over hear we got one.
I must try to get enough strength to call...

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Cluttering above huddled rooftops
Of sprawling villages 
And shy provincial towns;
Rising sharply amidst swooping
Declinations;
Hesitating when gathering at the
Tangled woodland perimeters of
Outlying greenland bounds,
Jostled apex ridges detach among
Themselves...
When habitually roused from early
Mornings
Newly awakened sounds.

Electrical milk floats whir...

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Black History
As this month comes to an end 
I want to begin 
First of all I want to thank so many
I will name a few although there's plenty
Martin Luther King
Had a dream
Yes he did 
That...

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The First Fleet
by Robert (Bob) Moore

The 26th of January, is called Australia Day
that was when some 10 pound poms, decided they would stay
they had been, for about a week, at a place called Botany Bay
not...

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In a Stolen Moment
by Michael R. Burch

In a stolen moment,
when the clock’s hands complete their inevitable course
and sleep is the night’s dark spell,
I call it a curse,

seeking the force,
the font of candescent words, the electric...

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Cowpoke
by Michael R. Burch, circa age 16

Sleep, old man...
your day has long since passed.
The endless plains,
cool midnight rains
and changeless ragged cows
alone remain
of what once was.

You cannot know
just how the Change
will rape the windswept plains
that you...

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Friendly pirate wannabe flies his Jolly Roger...
while surfing cyber seas today March 2nd, 2021.

Actually yours truly quite a literate codger
(ah shucks just missed being draft dodger)
no not for baseball team, but Vietnam War
circa November 1,...

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Translations of Holocaust poems by Ber Horvitz aka Ber Horowitz

Der Himmel
"The Heavens"
by Ber Horvitz
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
 
These skies
are leaden, heavy, gray ...
I long for a pair
of deep blue eyes.
 
The birds have...

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when Animal Farm is not a feeding manual

and Clockwork Orange strikes at midnight

Dali’s time piece warps under face value

and an eagle-eyed-cuckoo flies over its nest


beneath the cover of cotton candy clouds

she relieves herself into Magritte’s...

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Trespassers will be shot


I Survive not as a man but as a human being
I' am level but bent elements of life cast in a mutant haze
to come close to satisfaction my only compromise
brought up in...

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There once was a tree that was tall and beautiful. It was the talk of the forest. Its 
branches were sturdy, its leaves full, its trunk straight. Kids came from all around to climb 
its...

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I’m taking control of this physical presence of mine, this breaking ship;
pulling it down forcefully to the bottom of this god forsaken sea,
allowing it to be destroyed by nature once and for all.
I’m restoring it,
piece...

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