Long Pinafores Poems

Sonnets XC-XCVII

Artificial Smile
by Michael R. Burch

I’m waiting for my artificial teeth
to stretch belief, to hollow out the cob
of zealous righteousness, to grasp life’s stub
between clenched molars, and yank out the grief.

Mine must be art-official?zenlike Art?
a...

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These are prophetic poems and apocalyptic poems about the earth, climate change, global warming, extinction events, and mankind's role on an endangered world ...



Polish
by Michael R. Burch

Your fingers end in talons?
the ones you trim to...

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The flames of the furnace (well-travelled by wind
slowly glazing the rags of gray women chagrined
at the sight of a hair fleeing tresses now thinned) 
sometimes billow like waves flooding naves through the night,
when the lightning...

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Kitchen counters alive; the vivid colors of red, green, purple and yellow glass jars. Your garden flourished.
.
Pickled beets mingle boiled eggs; a pretty periwinkle purple.
.
Yellow and purple tinted fingers; dandelions and elderberries distilling; musty aroma...

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On the wind-swept Nebraska prairie sits a building in wretched shambles,
Surrounded by a sagging fence and overgrown with prickly brambles.
It was once a bustling one-room school house, abandoned long ago.
Its weather-beaten clapboards, I judged to...

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Sitting on a park bench
and taking in the sights,
she's always got an eye out
for the children, running
back and forth 'til they are wired,
while pestering their parents -
"Come on, Momma, we're not tired."

They cluster all around...

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Sitting on a park bench
and taking in the sights,
she's always got an eye out
for the children, running
back and forth till they are wired,
then pestering their parents -
"Come on, Mom, we're not tired!"

They cluster all around...

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Sitting on a park bench 
and taking in the view,
she always had an eye out 
for us children, right on cue.
With her muffler and a blanket
to keep away the cold,
she smiled to see us frolicking,
to...

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Sitting on a park bench
and taking in the view,
she's always got an eye out
for the children, me and you,
pestering our parents
with a grumble or a pout. 

We cluster all around her,
we call her 'Auntie Pearl,'
to...

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Sitting on a park bench
and taking in the view,
she's always got an eye out
for the children, me and you,
pestering our parents
with a grumble or a pout. 

We cluster all around her,
we call her 'Auntie Pearl,'
to...

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Sitting on a park bench
and taking in the view,
she's always got an eye out
for the children, me and you,
when we're pestering our parents
with a grumble or a pout. 

We cluster all around her,
we call her...

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Modern Appetite
by Michael R. Burch

"Women, wine, song ..."

It grumbled low, insisting it would feast
on blood and flesh, etcetera, at least
three times a day. With soft lubricious grease

and pale salacious oils, it would ease 
its way...

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The steel gray ocean pounds the shore,
it strikes a somber, morbid chord,
I sit becalmed now, by the roar,
on the porch of weathered boards.

I reminisce on times before,
when life was mine, an open door,
I lift my...

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It's seven o'clock and the sun is setting.
It's my least favourite thing about fall.
Too soon it will be days so short
we wonder if they were there at all.

Already the leaves on the trees are turning.
Such...

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DREAMING OF YELLOW POPPY FIELDS

Soft among the yellow poppy fields,
I clung to clocks of Dandelions,
Driven by my seeds of youth.
Breathless in their grace,
They gather all, rolling in the summer hay.
A bravura blow of what youth...

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bourbon iced tea
cashmere sweaters
billie holiday
strings of chilli peppers
buttery mercedes
french vogue
fans turning lazily
chanel sunglasses. hermes scarf. fendi purse.
its better to have real.
rice paper journals.
charcoal and oil
vanilla spice soaps, chamomile shampoo
running on the shore.
tongues lapping words like...

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