Long Scuffing Poems

Rejection Slips 3

Rejection Slip
by Michael R. Burch

Whenever my writing gets rejected,
I always wonder how the rejecter got elected.
Are we exchanging at the same Bourse?
(Excepting present company, of course!)

When editors reject my poems, did I slip...

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Juvenilia: Early Poems IV
I wrote this around age 17.



Bible Libel
by Michael R. Burch

If God
is good
half the Bible
is libel.

I read the Bible from cover to cover at age eleven, ten chapters per day, at the suggestion...

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She bustles
her boys out of bed
grouse, groan, growl
groggy gripes
snarky snipes, as they squabble
their way to breakfast

Packs their lunch
crunch, smack, munch, they eat
hurry boys-
catch the bus
flurry and fuss all the way
outdoors, scuffing floors

She sighs, so
relieved, can't...

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Sand in sheets
scuffing skin and reminding 
last nights attire reaks like bonfire
 a hundred days like this 
   a sea of endless laughs rolling 
     like filmreels infinitely looped...

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El Dorado
by Michael R. Burch

It's a fine town, a fine town,
though its alleys recede into shadow;
it's a very fine town for those who are searching
for an El Dorado.

Because the lighting is poor and the streets...

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WW1 WISCONSIN FOLKS MEANING THE PRISN SYSTEM IS CONTROLLED BY CORRUPTION CROOKED COPS MEXICAN QUEEN PIN DEALERS WW1 MEANING GANGSTER DISCIPLES THE 1 REPRESNT CITY FOLKS THE PITCH FORK YOU CAN VISIT THE WALLS BEHIND...

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I see your stare, I see you care 
I see your pity I see that you almost dare… 
Tears fill my eyes, sadness is etched on my face 
Look upon me and see deaths embrace...

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There’s no tread or scuffing hinted, 
By that tough father-like figure, 
Painted red, gown not flung on, 
But a thoughtfully configured picture. 

Bright red, vibrant with energy, 
For each kid, loud, silent or bewildered;
Wanting to...

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At the capitol rotunda
Two senators faced off on
Gun rights versus oversight
Each side bunkered in
Intractable, their way to win
Sharp tongued irate debate
Open thinking went kerplunk

Head to head, noses pressing
Like two rams rutting
One grabbed a neck
The other...

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THE BALLAD OF MISS DUTTON

Little Miss Dutton, 
Bright as a button
Sits with hands in her lap just so
Neat and petite, 
Friendly and sweet,
With little girls all in a row

Quiet and demure,
Polite and pure
She teaches girls...

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I wonder
If you'll ever know
That candles have been lit,
In my heart a bit.
Just listen to this call,
For once and all.
It matters you listen,
To let me out of this prison.
I lived once a life,
So sad and...

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The shoes display themselves in racks,
In lines of oddities without their partner shoe,
All kinds of people enter and to them make tracks,
To survey, try on these leathers of every hue.
The shoes wait not knowing who...

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when the music slows down it's final call

women and men pushing their way through the halls

locked in stalls rolling spliffs for the long haul

stuffing beer bottles under their wife beaters

scuffing up their new white adidas...

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New boots, pressing on my heels,
still stiff, not yet broken in,
stomping on roots, beds of needles
dropped by towering white pines,
scuffing on gneiss and granite
as they pound down the trail.

Have been walking since early morn,
a long...

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When sat before a blank page
I sometimes feel as lonely
as I imagine that blank page must feel 
however 
that blank page is also 
quite stark and challenging
daunting even
it seems to be anchored there
legs apart
fisted hands...

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The Old Man and the Seine


      For the legendary George Whitman

              (1912 – December 13, 2011)

 

King...

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You without scars
Where were you when the rest were climbing trees?
Scuffing shins, scraping our knees
Where were you when the hardest lessons were learned?
With everlasting reminders, carved in flesh
Where were you when we left home?
Bound to...

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Creek Bed, 
water flowing around rocks, 
bubbling through craw-dad holes,
churning, splashing, racing to lower ground,
sloshing about in the mud.

Creek Banks,
tumbling of rocks and dirt,
scratching, crawling to get out of the creek bed,
snapping, ripping of sod...

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At 7:12 am 
The sound of footsteps
Were always the same
Neither heavy nor light
As they made a scuffing sound
Shuffling by the window
Along with the sound
Of a large dog’s nails
Clicking on the ground

This particular morning
There were some...

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At 7:12 am 
The sound of footsteps
Were always the same
Neither heavy nor light
As they made a scuffing sound
Shuffling by the window
Along with the sound
Of a large dog’s nails
Clicking on the ground

This particular morning
There were some...

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I had never left you,

Hey you, are you listening,
Hey hey you I'm not footling,

When the sun was down,
I was your light,
When your mood was down,
I brought your smile,
You never were alone facing the world,
I was...

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In the dusting of springtime squeeze
Sweet-scented of yesterday glees. 
Recall of rose bloom and clear days,
Of mirth and warmth in many ways.

Meek breeze bears the whiff of ripe life,
Fresh beginnings and cease of strife.
The world...

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how long have we laid here
side by side
for an epoch's breath 
of starlight in a roving universe
enchanted moments 
see a night of a million years
until day slowly unearths us
from our play

but clinking and scuffing
distant voices...

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Wallflowers were once your favorite bloom, 
so you suddenly plucked me from off the wall.
Half dead, but not yet in the tomb,
you treated me like your little doll.

You revived me to speech and gave me...

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the heat presses down like a drunk cop’s boot,
metal fences shiver in the sticky Florida sun,
concrete walls spit their old secrets at you,
black mildew crawls across everything,
like it's alive and goddamn winning.

men with broken teeth...

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