Long Villanelles Poems

“Forever”



When The Terrors came,
The Uncontrollable Ones,
she closed her eyes
and listened for the notes
her mother had planted
amongst the deep blues,
beds of Forget-Me-Nots,
she followed the 
labyrinthine trail 
and through a gate unhinged,
it would seem destroyed, thrown aside,
she...

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Villanelles

The villanelle is a poetic form based on repetition, with a double refrain. 



Villanelle: The Divide
by Michael R. Burch

The sea was not salt the first tide...
was man born to sorrow that first day, 
with the...

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Rondels, Roundels and Rondeaux

These are poetic forms similar to villanelles, with refrains (repeated lines) and sometimes double refrains.



Rondel: Merciles Beaute ("Merciless Beauty")
by Geoffrey Chaucer
loose translation/interpretation Michael R. Burch

Your eyes slay me suddenly;
their beauty I cannot...

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Humming in hemlock heartbeats ~
along the shorelines
which once swallowed the sun 
in their searing shadows ~
I see those smoking seawaves
swirling upon my skin, 
as the silhouettes
of damask dahlia damsels
drizzle and dance
in the tornadoes of 
tangerine...

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Villanelle
by Michael R. Burch

Is poetry mere turning of a phrase?
Has prose become its height and depth and sum?
What happened to the songs of yesterdays?

Does prose leave all nine Muses vexed and glum,
with fingers stuck in...

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These are villanelles by Michael R. Burch and and villanelle-like poems...


Villanelle: Trump’s Retribution Resolution
by Michael R. Burch

My New Year’s resolution?
I require your money and votes,
for *you* are *my* retribution.

May I offer you dark-skinned scapegoats
and bigger...

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I was cursed with ink 
intoxicating blank canvases 
with toxic scribbles,
releasing twisted tales 
of suppressed troubles.
I was a forsaken  ebony rose 
in satan's grasp,
kneeling on ungodly needs
in a gothic fortress 
of woeful odes,
surrounded by...

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(WORK IN PROGRESS)

O ,wherefore thou ,is thy Sestina Angelina?
she is not here ., thy love thy dove
thou angel eyes hover...oft high above
Tis thyself, a gentleman who doth wait
whilst  me dreams and longs to view...

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VILLANELLES IV

She Always Grew Roses
by Michael R. Burch

a belated eulogy for my grandmother, Lillian Lee 

Tell us, heart, what the season discloses. 
“Too little loved by the ego in its poses,
she always grew roses.” 

What...

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sometimes I sing 
antique anthems,
of the nights 
I was confined 
  within a bottle
of diamond tears,  
wept woefully
   from the widest sky
that held kaleidoscopic stars~
amidst festooned fields of 
pixie-dust flowers,
hanging like...

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The following are Ten Villanelles written over a couple of nights. I was numbering them because I knew I wouldn't be able to post all at the same time. The Villanelle is repetitive and maybe...

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Tuesday, 12:00 am

Tonight t'was the stars
I'll cascade a memorizing moon
Glimmering sanctified silence 
along with 
trickling twilight for 
iconoclast ink, 
the serpentine key to 
sacred myrrh melodies
of my heirloom heart~
O glamorous specs of
citrine care to each
unravelling...

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From the Bluegrass, a poet named Milt
Took great care with the poems he built.
With both nuance and pace,
Gave the muse merry chase,
Graced the page with the ink that he spilt.

His posting are indeed a delight;
His...

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Lewis Milton Hankins or LM for short when I call him
Always writes poems amazingly in any form and theme
He’s an excellent poet, author and prolific writer
A man of God, as reflected in his poems--a great...

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I may take time to smile but keep it on,
May know not what life means, how it bears fruit,
I smile all day-- right from the red of dawn.

Sun be or silhouette shade, reason or none,
Greet...

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Writers wrong readers with wiles
Please protect poetry and prose
From flagrant fraudulent fancies
Of overwritten odius odes.

A related collection of poetry
Now can be published at whim.
The author just needs lots of money,
Hubris,and perhaps a few pencils or...

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It was tantalizing, sweet completion
Lines of blue ink filling white space
Tastes of emotions, colors of consonants
Music of vowels, syllables singing
To create, and satiate

Then, time thinned
Responsibility and stress stepped in
Poetry, after all, does not pay the...

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8

Who can even understand these words of insanity
I write with the feeling I'm the only one who will care
Considerations not made in selfishness or vanity

I look for some hope, but there is nothing left to...

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I wake one day, again for long to sleep 
All life to find: if life or death is fake, 
And learn, man’s here to sow, seldom to reap. 

Death lives with life all through lifetime...

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10

To move forward what would that possibly entail
An idea so strange, that I cannot even conceive
Knowing that I'm lost, still enchanted by your spell

You should consider all this, and consider it well
Maybe one day you'll...

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Upon the wind I hear her whispered song
she says “Come to me” with such urgency
I listen now as I’ve been all lifelong.

I turn to look, straining my eyes to see
just like a child who knows...

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9

How can tomorrow come if yesterday never dies
The only future I vision, is always tied to the past
All this happened for a reason is one of many lies

That may sound crazy, but I know what...

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Eyes dazed I stroll and quiver low, enticed
In liquid skyline’s twirl, a slow ballet
to pirouette on fireglows that ignite.
 
The meadow gleaming near as winds invite
An April centerstage that glides away 
eyes dazed I stroll...

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7

Finally stopping to catch my breath I am lost now
Knowing where I failed, my very worst decision
Not even recognizing myself, nor the why or how

What good is the field if the farmer cannot plow
Just getting...

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3

Love on my tongue the words now at the tip
Second thoughts and doubts kept me quiet
Chance never waits, away time does slip

Memories and dreams make the heart skip
A dead dream dominates my day and night
Love...

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