Long Staves Poems

I Know The Truth
by Marina Tsvetaeva
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

I know the truth?abandon lesser truths!
There's no need for anyone living to struggle!
See? Evening falls, night quickly descends!
So why the useless disputes?generals, poets, lovers?

The wind...

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Alone I arrive, walking from Frederick
over the gaps, across gentle hills
out onto a knoll
overlooking this burnished landscape.
Before me I see countless writhing rows
of indiscernible shapes gathered
in terrible rituals mid fire and smoke
darkening the sun.
From distant...

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DynDoeth managed to blurt out, 
     “Well done Joulupukki, that is enough,” over the growing din that surrounded him.  “Put your magic away.”
Joulupukki was reluctant to stop.  It felt...

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It's not about love, not about hate.
It's the promise of two that one can negate.
It's not about dark, not about light
It is about peace found after a fight.
It's not about courage, nor about fear
It's less...

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Combining the words “Fianna” and “Bard”, I give you the warrior-poet clan of the Fiard. 
Also, a fiard is an inlet of the sea with low banks on either side, common along the Gulf of...

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You see them loot on city streets,
attack people and leave them beat,
take what they want with no regard,
it’s ‘easier’ than working hard.
We see them take a human life,
with no regard for people’s rights,
defraud taxes, both...

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Golden swaying heads of the amber wavesthe sunshine sweetly upon the wheat fields’Tares are standing taller in their own graves               ...

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The ghost of Harriet Harris abhor real
disillusioned, disenchanted,
and disembodied (incorporeal
spirit of mine late mother) doth feel
displeasure toward this sole son seal

ling himself most every day inside
the one bedroom flat, a bargain deal
asper costs pegged to...

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Get ready

Maybe we should arm the homeless
give them all staves and stones
they could take over our mansions
walk right in and say, "I am home"
the gated communities will not help us
and there'll be no place to...

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My paper heart 
Flies like a bird 
And flutters like a butterfly 
When I feel my breath taken away.
It is weightless,
Gliding on air 
Along miniature music staves, 
Hop-hop-hopping to the notes 
In quarters, eighths, and...

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Stand In The Shadow Of A Tall Mountain


I went, to stand in the shadow of a tall mountain
not content to sail the deep blue seas.
Delicious sweet that bubbling brook, my fountain
amidst the flowers and massive...

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Straw Men (for Patrick and others)    

There are scant few of them now, standing
In the rows of my memorably failed crop.

They came dressed as they were.
I always complimented them.

Counting on them to...

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tittering totter is not a high heeled smoke alarm nor a ship

Valve number eighteen is open said the rasping snakelike male. Slithering. Pipe like gatherings of serpentalias sweeping. Above and below. A surface scarred tissue....

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Refuse to hang the innocent
While your gang acquits the guilty
In a tooth for a tooth pronouncement
You state in collusion with the mighty.

Accuse with the ruse in your news dissidents
Whipped into submission
To the coercion of incidents
Incorporated...

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I still remember your easily smiling face, poetry spilling from your lips
Singing joyfully at the dead of night, not a care in the world.
Oh how I miss your face when it was alive,
When it was...

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Lost in the moment, so perfect, complete;
gazing adoringly, flush with the thrill.
Waltzing, she stands on her daddy's two feet,
all else on pause now, just time standing still.

Gazing adoringly, flush with the thrill.
He is her hero;...

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A Song of My Brothers

Oh, elation true, I beat my savage breast anew
For the things I cannot understand,
For the brilliance in the cue I sing;
Fuse your efforts for they do bring this time unyielding;
The answers...

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A sweet secret 

Waves of depression without waste of opportunity,
Trade with season of whiff of irritation,
Worthy mentioned  whirlwind of smoke,
Animates to weight the wiles of innocence,
Tracing the bitterness with a touch of severity,
Train of...

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distortions of grandeur and praise
infect me and make me your slave
tranquility is but a phase
the sullen, the meek, the depraved

like shying fleece on the barter

delusions of ardor misplaced
inject faith that enmity made
in truths, she lay...

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Kind of Blue…

Slinking into a still hue of blues 
Haunting trumpets dart in and out
Like taxi horns in freeloading traffic
And cling like silk onto full figured rifs 
When winsome modal notes wear sleek cobalt 
...

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The howling of the lone gray wolf
His fingerprint sound waves
Reaches out to his alpha female
And to enemies like staves

His hunt unfruitful this night 
No ungulates found alive
Few scavenged tidbit pieces
Barely enough to survive

His alpha mate...

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as lover's stroll amidst the morning hush
silent eyes yawn, stumbling fingers entwine
whilst through frothy waves reflective skies blush
squalling seagulls sip the morning sunshine

silent eyes yawn, stumbling fingers entwine
as playful dolphins tumble in the waves
squalling seagulls...

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My love, annihilation of consign
that thee, in aptitude,  would frown on mine.
While adaptation vaguely draws the line,
that narrow thrust so vandalizing time.

Lean softly, thee contingent nature's rhyme
against my thought, a broaching matters fine,
staves holding...

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caught beneath a nautilus
rudders spinning, cutting my breath
into bubbles that pop on the surface
i never thought i'd get my wish
when i asked to taste the dead sea

salt and spit and sweat and piss
i'm drowning in...

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Yore of moments pass
From within the eve 
Of mazarine 
Heavens celestial body

Pulse of heatwave passions
As spell are cast
Of star gaze
She, upon the auspicious me

Sultry eyes, twinkle yet
Flicker, dance ablaze
Thus, traverse I must, to kismet
Walk the...

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