Long Woeful Poems

Athenian Epitaphs

Mariner, do not ask whose tomb this may be,
but go with good fortune: I wish you a kinder sea.
—Michael R. Burch, after Plato

Does my soul abide in heaven, or hell?
Only the sea gulls
in their...

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Doggerel II: Doggerel about Doggerel, or, More Nonsense Verse

The Board
by Michael R. Burch

Accessible rhyme is never good.
The penalty is understood:
soft titters from dark board rooms where
the businessmen paste on their hair
and, Walter Mitties, woo the...

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Simon wizard, you poor under his sway
That all things of God, which then of good will
Must be always brides, and you birds of prey

For gold and silver adulterate still,
Now it's time that the trumpet sounds...

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Placed First in:
This or That Vol 22 Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Edward Ibeh                       ...

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Written 12 December 2023         
Transmutation Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Unseeking Seeker

                 ...

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CAST:

Prince Zag The Freid: Son of King Othor The Freid, younger brother of Prince Zig The Freid

Duke Mor: Close friend of King Othor and an arbiter between father the king and of his son the...

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Forever wondering when I won’t be left behind and upset
Pondering if you’ll ever save me from burying me alive
Wandering in the woods of my spiralling mindset of regret
Squandering my time time after time and I...

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Drain away the pain that I feel
Drain away the rain that’s real 
Frozen in fire of your desire
Stay a while longer and admire
The healing rain that drains away the pain,
Nourishing the grains of His fruitful...

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The True Story

A Poem of the time, when as a 16 year old young fellow, and fresh from Blighty I spent 7 years as a Ringer in North Queensland, Australia. A Ringer is the Queensland...

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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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The fruit juice drips momentarily beneath the alter filling the crevices and corner, while the sound of impatient traffic rolls down the street honking horns and disrupting the peace. A strange sound starts rumbling in...

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*There are only two damsels in this tale; all variations were simply for ease of writing.

Once Kate and Isabella went
To see the pretty fields of Gwent
And traipse through forest shade
They packed a picnic lunch for...

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 Diary Notes: Lament at Dawn A Year Ago and yet now No Change
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Personal vicissitudes pronounced irrepressible self loathing

Ever since mine late boyhood
when unstoppable coded 
cellular processes did segue
I experienced abhorrence
toward yours truly,
an extremely introverted kid,
whose parents nor siblings
(one younger and older sister) could
not arouse him 

out of...

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Deep In Newly Disturbed Soil, Lies My True Love

(  “Our dead are never dead to us, until we have forgotten them” – George Eliot.)

Deep in newly disturbed soil, lies my true love
'neath a canopy...

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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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A FADING QUEEN
by
JOHN M. ARRIBAS

She had  all the feminine gifts those many years ago
Drawing stares from everyone where ever she’d  go
Back in high school, she was the center of attraction
In every classroom, she...

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People are wandering around the town
With their heads pointing to the clouds
People are wandering about the town
Looking like fearful clowns
Nasty men with hard backs 
Are walking about the park 
Harassing the women in the boiling...

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Standing all alone in the woods;
eyes shut, I feel the lilting light.
Sun dodges needles through the crown,
beams land on my skin softly so.
Brisk breezes quicken and rustle.
Bristlecone pines ever sway slowly,
while pockets of air blush...

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Donald Trump must be permanently lambasted...
and ewe know what else...
furloughed & barred from Whitehouse

Ducks of former self proclaimed Grand Poobah
getting lined up and goosed as these words typed
after trumpeting January 6th, 2021
as violent insurrection
Mitch Mcconnell...

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Placed 8th in :
No. 1264 New Poem Only Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Brian Strand

                   The Light Of Nativity

...

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Falling apart is human nature from the start
We cry when we break down with grief in heart 
Don’t walk away, but smile away the yearning of yesterday
Living, in general, is tough and fills me with...

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POTW

When Wishes were made on a shooting star
The Heavens looked down and smiled
With sprinkles of stardust on a whisper of moonbeams
They created for us a child

Soothed you were by twinkling stars
In a crib that faced...

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The mysterious night tiptoed silently and abducted me from my bed
I saw a  dispirited district somewhere in town staring blindly at its
hopeless inhabitants whose passion lay motionless in ruins 
lamenting the vengeance for its...

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