Long Thematic Poems

Erin, for a girl who embodies Ireland
by Michael R. Burch

All that’s left of Ireland is her hair—
bright carrot—and her milkmaid-pallid skin,
her brilliant air of cavalier despair,
her train of children—some conceived in sin,
the others to avoid...

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Poetic Encryption Like Ancient Egyptian

This terror and threat to poetic clarity,
Becomes a pet rock for some poets.

Words do count for sure, but so does
Clarity unless poets put a mask on.

Encryption can be used to mask...

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THE PERSPECTIVE OF ALABASTER SCROOGE

In modern English people time, when the world was full of eminent joy, there lived a man of prestige who was totally the opposite of anyone who strives to form the...

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He/I/they/all/we/none knowing sit/sats he/she thoughts he/she witnessed he/she held a behold as to what the hell a corporeal ring of things once unbeknowinest to him/her was about,: thought provoking, yet undeterminate in any reason with...

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The Anatomy of a Kural: Maxim Number 245 (taken at random) of the Thirukkural, the Tamil Classic on Ethics by Thiruvalluvar 

allal arulaalvaarkku illai valivalangum

mallalmaa naalam kari (K245)

“The teeming earth's vast realm, round which the...

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Mine slovenly unkempt appearance spelled embarrassment

spurred by most recent therapy session 
with Renee Cardone
whereby thematic thread
stitched how yours truly sewed
coping modus operandi,
viz avoiding emotionally volatile situations
courtesy mine trademark signature reactions 
rather than be in compliance...

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I have an inside Mother Eartha Voice
which She would prefer
to keep hidden
given any cooperatively healthy
democracy choice.

Mother Eartha
does not necessarily trust
the sexy grace
and beauty
of all Her StraightWhiteMale
potential Allies

College educated
but RightBrain contextually
environmentally 
straight white privileged
tone deaf

Unaware of...

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Khatia Buniatishvili's Tour de Force of Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto N° 1 in B-flat minor on Zubin Mehta's 80th Birthday*

… the caged-beast terrified defying the donderbus blasts vollies of muskets and cannons heralding the charge cavernous...

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December 24, 2015

There was a boy called Jimmie who was writing his letter to Santa Claus. The list of the gifts was very lengthy. It included a control remote car, a baseball bat, clothes and...

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The stitching across the genre                              ...

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I just wanted to thank Poetry Soup for, well, for being, for existing as a format for poets to share their hearts and souls. I can hardly believe it's been 6 years (gulp!) since I...

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Adulterous besieging capstone damnation
exploitation foists groping, heaving
insidiously jerking
knowingly lunges
machinations notoriously nymphomaniacal 
officiating penile quests
rapaciously, sadistically 
tenaciously, unstoppably 
vasocongested wickedness 
Xerses yawped zeolously.
*************************** 
All throughout history of  man/woman kind
ascendent civilizations extensively gouged, 
impailed, kindled, murderous...

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The pursuit of justice was for her, just a child
To acknowledge her life taken by organized crime,
those who acted out the worst kind of evil
With cops in their pockets, they could do anything
Had a chief...

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The Gospels share a negative understory,
thematic across all four.

However diverse these four voices may be
in describing and delineating Messianic love,
and political-economic priorities for poor spirits,
all four are univocal with anecdotal warnings:
If you are on the...

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while figuratively hunting
and pecking around me noggin
force hum theme to write about
lo and behold, the solution
stared me right in front
of my little knob nub nose with gentle clout

cuz, as an avid bookworm, the dictionary,
I enjoy...

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Love's Symphonic Passion
                                by...

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THE STATE OF OSTRACISM

Excommunicated by popular vote, I became isolated in a world chosen from birth.
Priests came to convert us, but we were practicing the Baptist faith.
Through mediums, they would include themselves.
They desire for power...

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Billowing taupe clouds, hunker down and hem in the Peninsula,
The morning rips open
A glimpse of sun shone; a lemon curd slivers between slits of of silver illumination
The first hint of light glances up frothing crests...

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Love is the theme                               ...

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Distant Light
by Walid Khazindar
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch 

Bitterly cold,
winter clings to the naked trees.

If only you would free
the bright sparrows
from your fingertips
and release a smile—that shy, tentative smile—
from the imprisoned anguish I see.

Sing!...

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ICE         NINE

The sourceling of anti-matter,
morphed in, a slithering form.
From Darkness's anteroom chamber-
The wormhole, in escape-
The place where disobedience was born.
A
  S
p
  i
r
  a
l 
staircase,...

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Vulessero Vasa, she called my name from the cleaned room.
There she asked: Vide O' Mare? no: no I answered, looking
at a painting Spira Tanti sentimento, yes she smiled
a perfection of sentiment, a glamorous rendering
or art....

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Away from tireless desk job i.e.,which obliged 
swearing allegiance, fealty, loyalty within complex 
edifice, where obsolete quaint rubric, schematic, 
thematic mantra "We Bring Good Things to Life,"
met with gnawing, emerging, chomping 
objectionable quandary. The sedentary...

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i dwell within the confines of a soft whisper in the snow
daily, i pray for the return of an innocence long departed
free from people's thoughts and their harsh judgements, i think freely
inside the frigid facility,...

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You are a lustful Pharisaic shark, who feeds voraciously from the sea of corruption.

You turn your soul away from the righteousness of God's ordinance, and now your head is sick with greed.

Your flesh burns with...

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