Long Speaks Poems

Epigrams by Michael R. Burch

If brevity is the soul of wit
then brevity and levity 
are the whole of it.
—Michael R. Burch

To write an epigram, cram.
If you lack wit, scram!
—Michael R. Burch

Conformists of a feather
flock together.
—Michael...

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"Open Oceans"



Kneeling on pearls
wisdom preys

praying
preying

hungry hearts
count the days 

wasting away
in all that preying 

for prayers 
to be answered

children become
strangers

reading 
strange words

finding 
themselves puzzled

genuflecting to a deity
they do not know, nor wish to

fumbling
mouths closed,

swallowed hole
in the...

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What fills your goals, son?

I told you!
Need to get my car rolling [life rolling, love rolling]
yesterday,
if not today...

If I may interrupt
to process mindful resilience
for a bit...

Let me ask again:
Noticing you are concerned about long-winded
and -winding
and...

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State of the Art (III)

These are my "ars poetica" poems: the ones about the art and craft of writing poetry in a modern world that doesn't always recognize the artists or their work. 



Come Down
by...

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My most popular poems on the Internet (II)

A number of my poems and translations have gone viral, according to Google, and some have been copied onto hundreds to thousands of web pages. That’s a lot...

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“The True Mother”

What part of a heart
in another could one trust
when betrayal comes
like a silver bullet, words and deeds
sharp piercing to burrow 
bleed out Life’s dreams 
rust crumbles to dust

Virulent apathy spreads 
Betrayal’s destruction 
hand...

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Poems about Poems IV

The Toast
by Michael R. Burch

For longings warmed by tepid suns
(brief lusts that animated clay),
for passions wilted at the bud
and skies grown desolate and gray,
for stars that fell from tinseled heights
and mountains bleak...

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Some days and nights
I am terrorized by death,
cold silo ache-echoing fear,
claustrophobic breathless dark
barking inevitable factness and finality
of my decomposing mortality,
of history's posthumous demise,
post-humorous as hell.

What good is death
if it cannot at least invite eternal engagement?
Hopeful...

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Imagine,
said Yin to distraught Yang,
never able to get quite enough of himself,
never enough time to fully become his ego-potentiality

Imagine this day opens a new rhetorical event,
a new day of conversation between Ego
and those you live...

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So, if I understand correctly,
you want to respond to inevitable energy descent
by upgrading incentives for cooperative communication,
positive information expansion,
research and regenerative design,
implementation,
and ecopolitical evaluation strategies?

Yes,
because we achieved current WinWin cooperative communication
and organic networking capacities
by virtue...

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Queen Gaia
of Earth's Shabbat
is here to speak today.

Unfortunately,
she can only sign,
and the only way she can see
is through our DNA/RNA fractally-balancing syntax,
so she has asked if she could respond to your questions
as she understands them
within...

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Angry FireGod sneers sarcasm,
"Not warm enough yet?"
"Still too much clean water and air
and other healthy stuff,
like sun-baked red chili peppers?"

Excuse me,
I was under the impression
that I invited you for my interview,
which would involve me asking...

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Fulfilled fantasies and legitimate realities…you do know how to please…
Are you listening to my voice of longing and yearning?
No, don’t backstab me with your broken promises…stop being a horrid tease…
Do not worry, Lord, I am...

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An old Greek word, ecclesia,
is often translated as church,
but could also be thought of as a civilization
acting civilly,
as a citizenry
acting as responsible citizens.

The noun side of Ecclesia
casts residents as consumers
of democratic and economic cooperative systems,
while...

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"The Sleeper and The Supernaturalist"


The Sleeper
shone as she walked 
through the Woods

shining alive 
like nothing
natural could

caught 
in the moonlight 
unaware

the innocent
red-caped roses stared
the trees whispered,

"beware, beware"

barefoot softly 
the Supernaturalist 
transfigures instead

from under shine 
she bares...

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Athenian Epitaphs II

These are ancient Greek epitaphs for lost family and friends, including dogs and other animals ...

Now his voice is prisoned in the silent pathways of the night: 
his owner's faithful Maltese... 
but will...

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Let’s say the number 1
iconically speaks in Left-Yang Universal Language,
root of ecosystemetrics,

while PlaceHolder (0)
bicamerally dreams in Right-YinDiPolar ReGenerative PolyCultural Action,
health-flow of autonomic, enthymematic thought and awareness
influenced by feelings of EarthCentric  BiCameral Consciousness
as Plan A,
so...

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I think he's talking about a cooperative bicameral political system,
with "How to talk to the other side".

And what could that possibly mean, dear Yang?

Well,
I was watching this Ted-talk from Marin,
by Robb Willer, as I anciently...

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Math speaks through us
within us
of cognitive landscapes
imagined still and/or moving.

Primal metrics are rational and symmetrical,
good as true as straightforward,
complex creation story problems
unfolding with precise answers,
right as at least not not ecologically wrong,
ecopolitically suboptimal perhaps,
yet at...

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DT2 came to me, unwillingly and clandestinely,
only because he was referred by his mother,
who was concerned that he was growing up and out
to become an ego-terrorist,
and she had heard of my feminist work as ecotherapist--
so...

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I'm not much of a writer,
more of an activist,
a doer,
timeless doing.

Anyway, my Yang side,
which you AnthroTribes might re-cognize as EcoJustice,
emerges from my PositiveYang/NotNegativeYin 
Win/Win Balancing 
compassionate/pleasant 
dialectically dipolar
co-binary appositional
positive/negative co-relational,
co-arising leftmind/rightbody hemispheres
of enbrightening light
and empowering...

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Genetic, so therefore regenetic, conservatism
of DNA and this fractal function's Elder RNA-rooted ecosystemic
political psychologies,
ecologies of empowerment,
and not so much;
History,
and notnot historic enculturation
of Business As Usual LeftBrain ReIterative Dominance
of deduction-reduction-redaction,
yet still dipolar-dialectical ecosystemic health 
(0)-sum-core-centric ecopolitical...

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"The Swoon Hypothesis" - Part 2



Arimathea stands next to you and I on the deck, soon we are back in Nazareth, you press into my palm, 
“A very rare Dubunni coin” you say - on...

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(His Version of Break My Heart)

I have each piece, each shattered part of your heart that I broke in two, I feel every ounce of pain, every emotion, just as you
I would never take this...

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Here he stands, Edwardian vogue, sometimes with his spats, 
sometimes with his brogues below his dungarees. With rounded collar points and tie, and jacket donned below this flying suit, his waste is tied with simple...

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