Long Steadily Poems

Poems about Fathers and Grandfathers III




Success
by Michael R. Burch

for Jeremy

We need our children to keep us humble
between toast and marmalade;

there is no time for a ticker-tape parade
before bed, no award, no bright statuette

to be delivered...

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Poems about Children IV

Salat Days
by Michael R. Burch

Dedicated to the memory of 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...

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The tears flowed and I still smiled,
My body and spirit and mind,
Were still in that state of residual bliss,
Soaking in your sweet smile,
And savoring the moonlit skin before me,
But my soul was being torn asunder,
And...

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Postcard 1
by Miklós Radnóti
written August 30, 1944
translated by Michael R. Burch
 
Out of Bulgaria, the great wild roar of the artillery thunders,
resounds on the mountain ridges, rebounds, then ebbs into silence
while here men, beasts, wagons...

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I shall resolve to leave this
Place now...
And steadfastly search out,
Nestling between ridge and bluff
Amidst the folds of a foreign 
Land,
Several acres of unkempt ground
Fallow and rough;
Upon which stands...
Crumbled stone walls
With an exposed slate roof in
Some...

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He just appeared to me, like wispily curling 
Chimney smoke, 
One grim and early morning in the very midst of 
Decembers briefest days, on the highest slope,
Toiling through my daily round; where, slowly 
Driving up...

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Stood I there, that last day,
On an iron bridge...
An aqueduct by design,
Where, looking dreamily out over
The Ernes Lower Lough,
My compressed shadow 
Momentarily paused -
To contently recline:
Amidst coy Junes radiant beams 
of sweet benign!
All was stilled,...

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I believe that I am..., but I dare ask the question.                        ...

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My most popular poems on the Internet (III)

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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Note:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Bysshe_Shelley
Percy Bysshe Shelley,  Born 4 August 1792
Horsham, Sussex, England[1]
Died , 8 July 1822 (aged 29)
Gulf of La Spezia, Kingdom of Sardinia (now Italy)
Occupation	Poet, dramatist, essayist, novelist
Alma mater	University College, Oxford (no degree)
Literary movement	Romanticism
Spouse	Harriet Westbrook
(m. 1811;...

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Swept up into piles; everywhere 
Abouts; in collected heaps all 
Around.               
It is almost as if the drab 
Streets were strewn...

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Quietly, the memory of my grandfather manifested itself,
In the colors and shimmers of the Holy Spirit, 
I saw his human face,
The familiar lines, the flesh,
The pair of oceanic eyes, slowly blinking 
Smiling,
Like a heavenly beam
Splashing...

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When I woke the next day,
He was lying beside me, breathing steadily
I was no longer on the hard, monstrous back of the leviathan
My hands were burned from its horns,
I was laid upon his wings,
Burdened by...

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Stars fall under failing skies...stars fall...stars fall...
But stars do not cry.
Into Ochs valley, through the Vale of White Horse...prancing 
besides a Dragons Hill;
It was here that a Roundhead - did a Royalist Cavaliers blood in...

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The inky black water sucks her in further
As she descends into the black depths of the abyss
Cloying dark swirls cover her head as soundlessly it reaches
Possessing her every inhalation – exhalation - it envelopes her...

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March 18-27

This time I woke, 
He was staring readily,
Smiling, plotting steadily

I lifted my body and gently gazed at his grotesque beauty
He was always at his best in thought…

“You look ravishing…” He began. 
“Mouth-parched, crusty-eyed, hair...

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Her cognition is sporadic
Longing for her to relax
And display calm tactics
Lay on my chest like it’s a hammock
When she isn't calm
I can't stand it
Cause behaviors like these in women
Can easily become habits
It won't happen to...

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The hearts of white men are silently fuming
The spirits of  angry widows steadily   grow bitter 
The bosoms of weeping mothers  open wide
While the relics of the past kept washing upon our...

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And the music began,
And with power so strong, I nearly fell back from the force
Snarling, smiling, demons held me upright,
As the Precarious Prince began,

“Dare you in silence come to me, Daughter of Eve,
To challenge my...

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When I'm gone...
You're gonna miss me over my dead body 
When I'm gone...
Till I'm gone...bye-bye, love...I guess I was your nobody and love everybody, but me...
When I finally belong 
You're gonna depart from me
When I...

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World War II Poems and Holocaust Poems - III - Miklos Radnoti

Miklos Radnoti was one of the greatest of the Jewish Holocaust poets. He died on a Nazi death march, shot to death in cold...

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One year Passed Damian Junior 
Was 15 months old. Damian 
Graduated from West Virginia 
University institute of Technology 
With honors and an
Associate of Applied Science 
Degree. His whole family 
Attended the graduation and
Congratulated him with...

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Heavy pressures of fame were getting to me, since I was world famous,
And desperately needed a getaway, as a rainbow sometimes detains us.

I was a successful performer, and ardent press went wherever I went,
Like exotic...

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I'm not among the best romantics on the planet.                          ...

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I.
GRAIL OF TIDES

from the brewing storm’s steeping chalice
the breath of death’s journey awakens in quiet tides 
beckoned by the stirring whisper of mortal winds
furrowed by stoic angels in pallid temporal skies
on wings they dance with...

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