Long Relatively Poems

His glowing golden eyes glistened with a comprehension beyond the mortal condition

A well-toned, tall, and tanned man, who most, not all, would call handsome

A brightly bleached stalactite overbite gleaned between the mean features of an...

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Nucleotidings
by Michael R. Burch

“We will walk taller!” said Gupta,
sorta abrupta,
hand-in-hand with his mom,
eyeing the A-bomb.

“Who needs a mahatma
in the aftermath of NAFTA?
Now, that was a disaster,”
cried glib Punjab.

“After Y2k,
time will spin out of control anyway,”
flamed...

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Look up in the sky ! It’s a bird ! It’s a plane.
It’s Superman !
More powerful than a locomotive, faster than a speeding bullet, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound. This fearless...

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On this day 40 years ago in 1978 my mother, Jacqueline Anne Trestrail, left this world after a relatively short battle with cancer - she was 46. Jimmy Carter was President and Annie Hall won...

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There is no argument from myself here, friend, 

If anything, that you can, and do appreciate; just as much as you are applying yourself towards these "seven" efforts' below, that is helpful to all parties...

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'Continental Drift' - The Metaphor

In the seventies (1), few people dreamed ‘it’ was true,
guessed by scientists first when rough coastlines compared (2)
matched like parts of a puzzle (a jigsaw), found place
that joined ‘drop-offs’ waves hid...

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Steven is a retired teacher disturbed by the problems he sees in education. Schools weren’t perfect when he was teaching but they were better than they are today. He has ideas for improvements. 

Some of...

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Two girls far apart leading different but crazy similar lives 
Lots of progress and work - arousing with small talk of becoming wives
But are those emotions genuinely what you wanna explore?
The journeys we will have,...

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Katie Osprey looked up from the ground 
And she knew this was no way to end a night on the town 
“Why did you dump me onto the Garden floor” 
Which made her four-legged love...

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As a mortal man of threescore and five years...

I bore witness and/or assimilated, gleaned,
and nursed implacable thirst for knowledge
courtesy reading factual narratives,
historical fiction, or biography
that since the advent of Homo sapiens
avast number of civilizations
and their...

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What are some differences
between post-millennial Trumpism
and pre-millennial Republicanism?

I know...I know!
Republicans used to be fiscal conservatives
but now support a one trillion dollar deficit
per unaffordable health and safety care year,

Expanded deficit spending 
despite taking more from not...

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HEADSTONES AND CHATTELS 

‘Twas pure chance that I discovered
Just the other day,
A place passed 
Countless times,
Never had the thought of calling in,
Inner thoughts and misplaced fears
Oh there must have been countless other reasons
For one to...

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Bateson: 
Pathology is a relatively easy thing to discuss,
health is very difficult.

Laotse:
Pathology is a functional issue for discernment,
organic health is difficult to miss
unless you have switched our cooperative evolution
for your personal competitive revolution.

Bateson:
...the sacred is...

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My acquaintance with poetry in general and the simplistic literary brilliance of Robert Frost in particular, came at a relatively early age. My mother would ambivalently imply that I was too young to remember, however...

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Dear people,
A true Voice speaks pure truth in two tones. 
      Real Ears can only hear one. 
Get one half of two true whole truths, 
    ...

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After entering the 'One Word' contest, I thought to myself,                         ...

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It should be harder,
and perhaps it could,
to not be known
and recognized
and to not find icons of and for gratitude
throughout my everyday.

The forbidden fruit
of Trees for Life and against Death
living in peaceful forests of Good and...

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Once again, yours truly takes poetic license.

Whenever the missus irks me or complains...
I tell her don't "Hock me in chinik" nor kvetch
before long tête-à-tête escalates in2 Kanipshin
whereby the Army National Guard gets called
World War III...

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A man takes a bath in his tired apartment
Old enough to remember the deportations that never happened 
Hums a careless tune - a forbidden tune. He gasps
Did the neighbours hear him? Will they report him?
Should...

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1: Which region of the globe has the lowest standard of living?

a. the Middle East.
b. sub-Saharan Africa
c. Asia.
d. Latin America.

2: Which of the following is not a country in the Third World?

a. Latin America
b. Asia.
c....

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( a college life vignette)

It’s Thursday morning, usually no one’s favorite, but this one seems sugary new, as if beamed in from a different, better universe. The clouds look fluffy and freshly washed.

Even the freshmen,...

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Bill hates to go to parties but he loves to go to wakes. One of the advantages of being old, he says, is that there are fewer parties to go to but a lot more...

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Not wanting to make anyone nervous,
pandemics can be unsettling enough
without economic and political surprises,
inconvenient systemic insights,
more expansive circles of empathy
positively impressing 
more than negative deep
steep hierarchies
practicing neglectful shallow sympathy
for Others
remaining NonMothers
on distant drowning pagan shores.

These...

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Into A Dark Raging Storm, Tempest And Hail


Into a dark raging storm, tempest and hail
alas, sadly all was to be to no avail.
Twelve pounders broke loose crashing about
some over the wind praying in a shout.

Prisoners...

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“Well I am indeed honoured dear Owl” replied Dumpty, thoughtfully he perceived this might be a good time to enquire about what he had witnessed by the river, so without preamble he asked the learn'ed...

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