Long Sleepless Poems

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...

Read More

Juvenilia: Early Poems V

Poetry
by Michael R. Burch

Poetry, I found you
where at last they chained and bound you;
with devices all around you
to torture and confound you,
I found you—shivering, bare.

They had shorn your raven hair
and taken both...

Read More

The angles are in the storm
Just before  the break of dawn
Sending a message to everyone
Telling them to remain calm
The angels are singing out loud
They want to break the treacherous cloud
 and relinquish that awful...

Read More

Watching wan moonlight
illuminate tree limbs,
my heart also brims,
overflowing with autumn.
—Ono no Komachi, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

As I slept in isolation
my desired beloved appeared to me; 
therefore, dreams have become my reality
and consolation. 
—Ono...

Read More

Poems about Poems III

Radiance
by Michael R. Burch

for Dylan Thomas

The poet delves earth’s detritus?hard toil?
for raw-edged nouns, barbed verbs, vowels’ lush bouquet;
each syllable his pen excretes?dense soil,
dark images impacted, rooted clay.

The poet sees the sea but...

Read More

As I slept in isolation
my desired beloved appeared to me; 
therefore, dreams have become my reality
and consolation. 
—Ono no Komachi, translation by Michael R. Burch

Submit to you—is that what you advise? 
The way the ripples...

Read More

I have a lot to write and say, buddy, so hear me out some more
Don’t make me feel lower than I have ever felt before…
Listen, understand and stay quiet until I say no more…sorry if...

Read More

In the dark of night a wind took hold,
With powers charged to shake the sky,
By moody swings of gods up high,
Their breath alone enraged and bold.

In the dark of night history spoke,
Of a world alive...

Read More

It was September 
Of one thousand 
Nine hundred seven
The end of summer
With apples lying thickly
Under the apple trees
And the smell of Autumn
Covering the grass
Filled with ripe yellow
And orange squash
He was born in a little
Wooden house...

Read More

SHE was my wife, once ...

long ago, so very long ago ...
we met on the showboat, up-river,
almost fifty years back now ...
I was a young officer for the Confederacy,
working for the Yanks after The Turn,

supplying...

Read More

Twice the night had fallen upon a sleepless slumber,
Yet again awoken by winter when the third was three in number.

I sense that a silence doth sneak ‘tween cracks of weathered wood,
Conniving with that which shadows...

Read More

Once the night had fallen upon a sleepless slumber,
Whence the winter woke me when the third was three in number.

I sense that a wince doth lurk and wear which wicked gaze,
Of conniving shadows cast between...

Read More

Thrice the night—the day!—both fell to sleepless slumber,
But now in Spring, though yet again: The third was three in number. 

I sense a wince remind itself,
Of what it means to be,
Instead to beg for booked...

Read More

Standing up for the kids standing up to sleep in overbearing heat clothes damp from their pee, God made night separate from day, but with lights bright all night as well as all day, the...

Read More

Femme Fatale By A Wishing Well 
  (In The Wastelands Of War)

Warm as breath on placid skin,
Soft as gentle summer rains,
Loud as natures angry clouds
That gather in ambushed lanes,
To confer with the wounded boys
Whose...

Read More

This is a poem (Original Title “Mukti” in Bengali, which means “Freedom”) by India's Nobel-laureate poet, Rabindranath Tagore (1861 - 1941) - a poet, writer, playwright, composer, social reformer and painter. He was a man...

Read More

A friend—
not a good one, but a close one;
one that I couldn’t let go
If I could see you now, I don’t know what I would say…
there were always things I didn’t know

but I loved you...

Read More

My stomach is growling from the coconut trash bubbling in my system, my stomach is growling from toxic energy circulating in the street. My stomach is growling from words people are shouting in the town;...

Read More

.So this one was really just a bit of fun I wanted to try and incorporate some really old slang type language within the piece, I've included a glossary below for the old words but...

Read More

Far beyond the horizon we gazed at sunlit skies 
glowing from gigantic mountains, thick blue clouds
hang peacefully over our heads, painting hopes and 
aspirations as we journey relentlessly to recapture
our dreams.

We have been climbing this...

Read More

~A To Z An Amazing Couple~

A is for Allow me to write a poem about my best friends 
love affair with an army man, she was 35 years old he was 
the same age living...

Read More

Everything seems better when I am in my own world 
Everything is better when there is no one there
Once when I had someone 
When I felt friendlier 
When all I wanted to do was be...

Read More

I loved my job as a botanist, which took me to many foreign lands,
Like the golden sun rises smiling, to meet all our natural demands.

I was always marked for this work, ever since I was...

Read More

I could not do what you are mandated to do
every day on society's justice bench,
weighing retributive justice 
against restorative healing.

I cannot look with any comfort
at police
and correction officers'
routinely criminalizing vocations,
and courtroom injudicious levying of fines
against...

Read More

The Sun begins to rise as I lay here in bed, 
Listening as these questions repeat in my head. 
I know I should be sleeping 
But I choose to listen instead. 
Searching for an answer,...

Read More