Long Road Poems

An icy chill descends on 13 Beaver Veil Cottage as sisters Ester and Ellie walk gingerly up the steps on this wet and windy night.
This once charming pied-a-terre was now in a final phase denouement.
The...

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n icy chill descends on 13 Beaver Veil Cottage as sisters Ester and Ellie walk gingerly up the steps on this wet and windy night.
This once charming pied-a-terre was now in a final phase denouement.
The...

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~~**This poem is super long, but it took me hours to write. I hope you all enjoy reading this as I have enjoyed writing it wholeheartedly.**~~

Awful anger expressed in verses
Didn’t give me blessings, but curses
I’m...

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“Come on, let's get introduced to my play mate in a palm.
Linda, these are Joshua’s true other selfs.” 
Lelia emitting a peculiar chuckle.
A comic situation arose where I changed my voice for each of my...

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Verse 1: We held hands and I fell under your spell...you are the hell from above
My heart has turned to ashes, but I rose again like a Phoenix because of you and I's love
I bled...

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You’re sick, demented, and twisted and you want to judge me for my sins? What about yours? The ones that lie deep within
The ones that sculpted you into the person that you are, the ones...

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I have been trying to find the right words to pen this verse, but since I came to this country my words are suppressed and my voice is oppressed. The wind is blowing furiously, and...

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I wrote this random rap song just yesterday! Have a blast, reading it! :D
"We shall all be like magnets,
Connecting to God's Laws in perfect symmetry 
We shall all shine as the sun,
Glorifying the son of...

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Oh my soul what hails you?
Oh my soul what awaits you?
Oh my soul why are you in despair?
Oh my soul I have not deserted you
Oh my soul I have something to share
Oh my soul I...

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I often surprise many people in many ways
With the words I say…with the actions I make…
It’s extraordinary how many seek high praise
With the words they say…with the actions they fake…

Neither will I…
Assume the worst in...

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I see people moving, but going nowhere
I see people moving with their hands thrown in the air
I see people moving but they have nothing to share
Bags and pans, old kettle, and old man
The scavenger, the...

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Poem revised Memorial Day May 30th, 2022 at 1500 hours

Flagrante delict adulterous sordid behavior 
automatically linkedin with Lothario;
an unscrupulous seducer of women, 
based upon a character 
in The Impertinent Curious Man, 
a story within a...

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“Son”...”say goodnight to grandpa”

Spurred by mother dearest 
as well as other politesse
drummed into her second born
fobbing blandishments as incentive
tumbled off fingers of prodigal son
tripped wordsmith to splutter forth
forthwith the following lines.

Back in the day 
quaint...

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Poems about the Coronavirus I


yet another iffy coronavirus haiku #1
by michael r. burch

plagued by the Plague
i plague the goldfish
with my verse



yet another iffy coronavirus haiku #2
by michael r. burch

sunflowers
hang their heads
embarrassed by their coronas

I wrote...

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The first soft snow: 
leaves of the awed jonquil 
bow low
—Matsuo Basho translation by Michael R. Burch

Come, investigate loneliness! 
a solitary leaf
clings to the Kiri tree
—Matsuo Basho translation by Michael R. Burch

The cheerful-chirping cricket
contends gray...

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Dusk-gliding swallow, 
please spare my small friends
flitting among the flowers! 
—Matsuo Basho translation by Michael R. Burch

A bee emerging
from deep within the peony's hairy recesses
flies off, sated
—Matsuo Basho translation by Michael R. Burch

That dying cricket,...

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Poems about Fathers and Grandfathers I

I translated the first six Native American poems for my father when he chose to enter hospice and end his life by not taking dialysis …


Cherokee Travelers' Blessing I
loose translation/interpretation...

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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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It had been a hellish week.

On Monday
my lonely and tired AfricanAmerican husband
told me, as gently as possible,
that what I had hoped was a temporary separation
is to be extended into perpetuity.

This separation had been scheduled to...

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(In a Lush Garden Somewhere Out There)

The student stands where shifting sands of thought
Once firm with reason 
now elusive truths are sought.
Its splendor wanes 
a threadbare fading strand,
A quest for wisdom 
in this digital land.

Sage:...

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“The Fallen”



Remote,
he sees himself 
in the reflection of cold close 
yet distant shop windows, 
his final journey along the 
Hard Time Road
walking alone, 
unforgiven, no home
for the rest of his natural life 
a million knives...

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Juvenilia: Early Poems IX

These are early poems of mine, written in my teens as a high school student and during my first two years of college.

Shock
by Michael R. Burch

It was early in the morning of...

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For All That I Remembered
by Michael R. Burch

For all that I remembered, I forgot
her name, her face, the reason that we loved ...
and yet I hold her close within my thought:
I feel the burnished weight...

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Salat Days
by Michael R. Burch 

(dedicated to my grandfather, Paul Ray Burch Sr.)

I remember how my grandfather used to pick poke salat ...
though first, usually, he’d stretch back in the front porch swing,
dangling his long...

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IN THE WILD

Early morning, we go for a drive,
An awesome feeling as we arrive,
At our camp gate which, opens 
At 6 o’clock, 
Now we are in the African bush
Which, will unlock,
Moments that we have missed...

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