Long Unsettle Poems

Tell me, my friend,  
does infinity not unsettle your reason,  
or is it a comfort—to believe it meaningless?  

Look beyond the rust of your disbelief—  
this isn’t the frostbitten dogma you...

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Banks o' Doon
by Robert Burns
modern English translation by Michael R. Burch

Oh, banks and hills of lovely Doon,
How can you bloom so fresh and fair;
How can you chant, ecstatic birds,
When I'm so weary, full of care!
You'll...

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To a Louse
by Robert Burns
translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Hey! Where're you going, you crawling hair-fly?
Your impudence protects you, barely;
I can only say that you swagger rarely
Over gauze and lace.
Though faith! I fear you dine but...

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This was written first night of my recovery from complex spinal surgery to fix my paralysis, while in ICU.  Still there

.Wee Hours of a Chess Match
I have still been passing
The long, wee hours of...

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The past got a wet way of coming back
to unsettle the present
	with haunting future dreams
Who moistened the bed
with such troublesome memories?
There are dark terrors in the night
for the children 
of those whose fathers ignited the...

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The mist fell over the lake like a grey blanket.
Only the sound similar to a ranket*
The water still and lifeless, not a ripple to be seen.
The air not foetid but fresh and clean.

And I felt...

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Tucked inside a box of dust, hidden beneath the weight of years, I found it—a photograph. Its edges were curled, its surface clouded with time, but the image within was clear enough to unsettle me.

There...

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Have you ever wondered what poets hide in their minds,
where universes of words and unspoken dreams lie?
Look closely, but carefully, lest you become the beast
that slowly, slowly splits their skull of fallen stars.
Poets are not...

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He has a caring heart, he has the passion 
He came to his own, his own accepted him 
He came to render selfless service to his people 
The burden is upon his solder, he's ready...

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Advance and dance towards destiny
Galumph
Defy the lie and cry of scrutiny
Triumph 

Over hurdles seen and unseen
Drive and dive to arrive
At the intersection where a queen
Awaits your appearance as you strive

To breach odds stacked against success
Meant...

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anguish overflows


pouring thoughts 
into a legitimacy

I had been told 

best left not to unsettle
what has been imposed


but that corrosive tolerance
will slow drip life if left seeded 


a door that had guarded 
a frail lock 
began...

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Never Forgotten

In silence I do sit
And think amongst a dream
Nothing will be real
For a reverie cannot redeem.

Fiction or non-fiction
I try to narrate
Yet it tends to work against me
My mind cannot relate.

You mean so much to...

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The sun has taken a day off, 
sleeping in blankets of silver 
while the Earth dances a slow pirouette, 
like the venerable ballerina she is, on her axis. 

I ponder the grayness 
while thinking of...

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The evenings cool became tempered.
 The dreams made light of the day
 There in shadows were fearful things
 Yet the light shone brightly in the room

What is it I asked that things are unbalanced
 A...

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Coastline of the peat swamp is obscuring. 
In addition, the shadow of a lone angler.  
Water lilies turn purple as the sun is setting.

Avoid being stung by sedge and strangler.   
I'm up to...

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Underground rivers unsettle thoughts,
feelings on stable ground.

Real estate doesn't sound as real
with thoughts of hyporheic flow
beneath our feet,
out of sight and sound.

Rivers are meant to have light on top,
transparency.
Underground flow must look more like a...

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With a deadly combination of smooth and
reasonable, he was a nice guy
He spoke low with a drawl
I slowed down to hear his every word, he was a
nice guy
He came like the wind that threatened 
to...

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I hover outside the fringes of a distant crowd
a soft disquiet looming beyond the darkness
the moons of Jupiter sucking me into a shroud.

I choose to be pleasantly placid this moment
my eyes fixed at the faint...

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Someday, maybe
I will be unshakeable
unmovable
steadfast-

I tell myself.

So secure in
myself and the
present moment and
all the little minuscule things
that I control

That nothing and no one
will ever shake me up
unsettle or disturb me
ever again...

Like a monk
breathing out, breathing...

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I came to you with open arms
fell in love with all your charms
before they turned a witch's brew
with open arms, I came to 

passion can hide the truth of things
an evil heart and what it...

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The dust hovering just above their souls
A journey lay dormant awaiting to recoil
Through their dead skin these footprints dwell
Is my rhythm a curse from some ancient spell?

I lived as a blind bat in pockets of...

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Imagine i would have killed myself that night

without grabbing a pencil or even putting up a fight.

I feel like my life has gone from the dark to the light,

But from the light to the dark...

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Forever my love my starving heart beats
At the path of velvet red rose petals
Scattered towards the lull of satin sheets
Where there we settle under prism crystals

We trace benignly through romantic sighs
With the waning and ebbing...

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Bat 

At day I hide from din 
When silence prevails at night 
I venture out to feed my soul 
And perch on the boughs of words 
Up side down 
And covertly wait for a prey...

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After the putsch, through night he set himself alight
ensnared in flames of societal conflicts, for a
vision of tomorrow, in the birth of a bloody dawn.
The drone of history had failed on a loaded salt.

A solitary...

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