Long Surf Poems

They were gambling in front of the house.
Manservants and pages bustled about
Serving Suitors who just curse and carouse.
Few mix wine with water. I heard one shout,
"Clean down the tables with wet sponges! Rouse
Yourselves! And when...

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"As other spirits sail on music, mine, oh my love, swim on your perfume." Charles Baudelaire

"Sometimes you find an old bottle from which the soul returns." 
Charles Baudelaire

"Smell is a Word. Perfume is Literature."

"There are...

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Juvenilia: Early Poems by Michael R. Burch

In the Whispering Night
by Michael R. Burch

In the whispering night, when the stars bend low
till the hills ignite to a shining flame,
when a shower of meteors streaks the sky
while...

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I love you only because I love you
by Pablo Neruda
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

I love you only because I love you;
I am torn between loving and not loving you,
Between apathy and desire.
My heart vacillates...

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Sonnet LXXXI-LXXXIX

Day, and Night
by Michael R. Burch

The moon exposes pockmarked scars of craters;
her visage, veiled by willows, palely looms.
And we who rise each day to grind a living,
dream each scented night of such perfumes
as drew...

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I was listening to Cornell West,
who described our catastrophic tolerance of disvalues for others,
situations we would never tolerate for ourselves,
disvalues like homelessness and hunger,
but also like random violence, 
abuse and neglect,
lack of caring,
as a "conspiracy"...

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Dream-worker 
delves deeply into my dream;

vibrations fondle anticipation
foreplay wakes wide-eyed 
swells of liquid libido quake the rendezvous edge -
a primordial being in his prime
a masculine ego quest for affaire d’amour;
her night-loving body 
c h a...

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THIS WORLD OF DEW

This world? 
Moonlit dew
flicked from a crane's bill.
—Eihei Dogen Kigen, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Seventy-one?
How long
can a dewdrop last? 
—Eihei Dogen Kigen, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Dewdrops beading grass-blades
die before...

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Thanks for your letter
asking for a free Taoist consult
on how to bring God talk
and experience
back into our Big Agri-MilitantIndustrialized Busyness Schools
and possibly our extended family lives,
on into our inside Holy of Holies,
our Climates of PanEntheistic...

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I went again today ... to that place, the allurement overwhelming ... the one
we called "ours" so tritely, "mine" before you, "mine" again now, (tho' others
have doubtless staked claimed - ages before and since). I...

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I suppose you might have missed out on Paul Feyerabend's,
and especially Thomas Kuhn's Problem of Incommensurabiity.

Oh, not at all.
I have not looked at science or culture
or language
or even your attempts at communication
quite the same since...

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TITLE:
       Xenophobia

Heed the warning
This isn't for the faint of heart
Verbalizing my deepest yearnings 
They're bound to be a bit tart...

Because where I'm from is called the Bible Belt
Where folks...

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A born lioness my untamed heart? ha! 
a mouse, this pulsing token ruled by unruly wants
at times given, traded or stolen - sometimes
thrown down on a dare to be won or lost 
till it became...

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Life as active love evolves toward more polycultural communication,
across both species and time,
within Earth’s Solar EcoSystemic Universe.

While this conversation includes human natured communicators,
we suboptimize our ecological balance
if endo-human discourse monopolizes our lifetime learning dialogue.

A life...

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OUR BABY GIRL TURNS 21

ON 1ST JULY 1990~ THE ANGELS DID SOMETHING ALMIGHTY
FROM HEAVEN THEY SENT US OUR LIFE-LONG DESIRE-A PRECIOUS DAUGHTER TO LOVE AND ADMIRE.
TRUE TO YOUR NATURE YOU ARRIVED WITHOUT FUSS OR PAIN--THE...

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As she saw it.


The mountains and the meadows were always so beautiful this time of year.  It seemed as if a fresh new world always came to life. The high cliffs turned sharply downward....

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"We have an enemy within called the ego
who prevents us from using our mind intelligently.
It hides deep within our heart
and emerges with regularity
to challenge and consume our will."
     Rumi (M. Mafi,...

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My TransITion began there
right there
in my woodland playground,
when I first knew
something right feels wrong to others.

I was blind to curve-balls
hurled at me.
Being "It" is not why I grow
this TransIt mind and body!

Or, is it?

Could I...

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Invisibly tortured courtesy existential nihilism

Psyche wracked with agony
impossible mission to extricate lovely bones
they wanna remain permanently abed.

I chiefly function to amass knowledge
courtesy assiduously, habitually,
and judiciously reading
an eclectic assortment of written material.

Yours truly woke
with ambition, disposition,
inclination,...

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Dark Gothic Heart, A Valiant Knight & The inner harmony tuned to its hidden beasts menagerie 

Dark Gothic Heart

I look to the sea
viral implications take me to the surf
along the rocky ledge leads to an...

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Word Fantasy in F Sharp Minor  (3 Movements)

1

(Andante con moto)

Hey man. Take this.

I got it last night,
under a fractured street light,
with shattered pieces of clear glass, scattered
at the nexus of an obscure dark freeway...

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The tale below was carved one night
upon the stone, by candlelight
...most won’t believe, but some just might
.........most won’t believe, but some just might



            ...

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I believe SuperEgo bicameral comprehension
functions, forms, and flows organic
ecotherapeutic integrity;
I believe balanced Left-Right consciousness
orbits toward ecstatic psychology.

I've got nothin' to say
And I'm gonna keep it just that way
'til my mean old SuperEgo
lets me go outside...

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Once upon a ZeroTime
we suffered great terror and loss.

People,
animals,
and plants
refused to speak kindly with each other
because of a Big Bad Wolf
named Ms. Climatic Change 
by her delightfully demented transparents.

Most all credible scientists in that day
were...

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Political Science of Eco-Educational Vocations

Really? That’s my topic?
Didn’t Paulo Freire already do this one?

Oh, I see..ecosystemic learning and mentoring,
including pedagogical development systems
doing the best we can,
bless our matriotically nurturing hearts,
to figure out our own deep...

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