Thirty

These are poems about "turning thirty" and facing time, maturation, and one's own mortality ...



Thirty
by Michael R. Burch

Thirty crept upon me slowly
with feline caution and a slowly-twitching tail;
she waited three decades for the winds to shift;
now, claws unsheathed, she lies ready to assail
her helpless prey.

Keywords/Tags: thirty, age, aging, maturity, maturation, time, creep, creeping, ambush, feline, predator

Distances (I)
by Michael R. Burch

 
Moonbeams on water―
the reflected light
of a halcyon star
now drowning in night ...
So your memories are.

 
Footprints on beaches
now flooding with water;
the small, broken ribcage
of some primitive slaughter ...
So near, yet so far.

 
This is probably my favorite of my unpublished poems. The next poem has the same title but is very different.


 

Distances (II)
by Michael R. Burch

 
There is a small cleanness about her,
as though she has always just been washed,
and there is a dull obedience to convention
in her accommodating slenderness
as she feints at her salad.
 

She has never heard of Faust, or Frost,
and she is unlikely to have been seen
rummaging through bookstores
for mementos of others
more difficult to name.
 

She might imagine “poetry”
to be something in common between us,
as we write, bridging the expanse
between convention and something . . .
something the world calls “art”
for want of a better word.
 

At night I scream
at the conventions of both our worlds,
at the distances between words
and their objects: distances
come lately between us,
like a clean break.
 

Well, actually after rechecking the second “Distances” has been published by Verse Libre, Triplopia and Lone Stars!


 

Winter
by Michael R. Burch

 
The rose of love's bright promise
lies torn by her own thorn;
her scent was sweet
but at her feet
the pallid aphids mourn.

The lilac of devotion
has felt the winter hoar
and shed her dress;
companionless,
she shivers―nude, forlorn.

 

Southern Icarus
by Michael R. Burch

 
Windborne, lover of heights,
unspooled from the truck’s wildly lurching embrace,
you climb, skittish kite . . .
 

What do you know of the world’s despair,
gliding in vast solitariness there,
so that all that remains is to

fall?

Only a little longer the wind invests its sighs;
you
stall,
spread-eagled, as the canvas snaps

and flaps
its white rebellious wings,
and all

the houses watch with baffled eyes.


 

The Sky Was Turning Blue
by Michael R. Burch

 
Yesterday I saw you
as the snow flurries died,
spent winds becalmed.
 
When I saw your solemn face
alone in the crowd,
I felt my heart, so long embalmed,
begin to beat aloud.
 

Was it another winter,
another day like this?
Was it so long ago?
 
Where you the rose-cheeked girl
who slapped my face, then stole a kiss?
Was the sky this gray with snow,
my heart so all a-whirl?

How is it in one moment
it was twenty years ago,
lost worlds remade anew?
 
When your eyes met mine, I knew
you felt it too, as though
we heard the robin's song
and the sky was turning blue.

 

Love’s Extreme Unction
by Michael R. Burch

 
Lines composed during Jeremy’s first Nashville Christian football game (he played tuba), while I watched Beth watch him.

 
Within the intimate chapels of her eyes―
devotions, meditations, reverence.
I find in them Love’s very residence
and hearing the ardent rapture of her sighs
I prophesy beatitudes to come,
when Love like hers commands us, “All be One!”


 

Kindred
by Michael R. Burch

 
Rise, pale disastrous moon!
What is love, but a heightened effect
of time, light and distance?
 

Did you burn once,
before you became
so remote, so detached,

so coldly, inhumanly lustrous,
before you were able to assume
the very pallor of love itself?
 

What is the dawn now, to you or to me?
We are as one,
out of favor with the sun.
 

We would exhume
the white corpse of love
for a last dance,

and yet we will not.
 
We will let her be,
let her abide,

for she is nothing now,
to you
or to me.


 

Lozenge
by Michael R. Burch

 
When I was closest to love, it did not seem
real at all, but a thing of such tenuous sweetness
it might dissolve in my mouth
like a lozenge of sugar.
 

When I held you in my arms, I did not feel
our lack of completeness,
knowing how easy it was
for us to cling to each other.
 

And there were nights when the clouds
sped across the moon’s face,
exposing such rarified brightness
we did not witness

so much as embrace
love’s human appearance.

 

Dust
by Michael R. Burch

 
Flame within flame,
we burned and burned relentlessly
till there was nothing left to be consumed.
Only ash remained, the smoke plumed
like a spirit leaving its corpse, and we
were left with only a name
ever common between us.
We had thought to love “eternally,”
but the wick sputtered, the candle swooned,
the flame subsided, the smoke ballooned,
and our commonest thought was: flee, flee, flee
the choking dust.


 

Consequence
by Michael R. Burch

 
They are fresh-faced,
not innocent, but perhaps not yet jaded,
oblivious to time and death,
of each counted breath
in the pendulum’s sway
falling unheeded.
 

They are bright, undissuaded
by foreign tongues,
by sepulchers empty and waiting,
by sarcophagi of ancient kings,
by proclamations,
by rituals of scalpels and rings.
 

They are sworn, they are fated
to misadventure and grief;
but they revel in life
till the sun falls, receding
into silent halls
to torrents of inconsequential tears . . .
 

. . . to brief tragedies of tears
when they consider this: No one else sees.
But I know.
We all know.
We all know the consequence
of being so young.


 

Cycles
by Michael R. Burch

 
I see his eyes caress my daughter’s breasts
through her thin cotton dress,
and how an indiscreet strap of her white bra
holds his bald fingers
in fumbling mammalian awe . . .
 

And I remember long cycles into the bruised dusk
of a distant park,
hot blushes,
wild, disembodied rushes of blood,
portentous intrusions of lips, tongues and fingers . . .
 

and now in him the memory of me lingers
like something thought rancid,
proved rotten.
I see Another again―hard, staring, and silent―

though long-ago forgotten . . .
 

And I remember conjectures of panty lines,
brief flashes of white down bleacher stairs,
coarse patches of hair glimpsed in bathroom mirrors,
all the odd, questioning stares . . .
 

Yes, I remember it all now,
and I shoo them away,
willing them not to play too long or too hard
in the back yard―
with a long, ineffectual stare

that years from now, he may suddenly remember.


 

The Evolution of Love
by Michael R. Burch

 
Love among the infinitesimal
flotillas of amoebas is a dance
of transient appendages, wild sails
that gather in warm brine and then express
one headstream as two small, divergent wakes.
 

Minuscule voyage―love! Upon false feet,

the pseudopods of uprightness, we creep
toward self-immolation: two nee one.
 

We cannot photosynthesize the sun,
and so we love in darkness, till we come
at last to understand: man’s spineless heart
is alien to any land. We part
to single cells; we rise on buoyant tears,
amoeba-light, to breathe new atmospheres ...
and still we sink.
The night is full of stars
we cannot grasp, though all the World is ours.
 

Have we such cells within us, bent on love
to ever-changingness, so that to part
is not to be the same, or even one?
Is love our evolution, or a scream
against the thought of separateness―a cry

of strangled recognition? Love, or die,
or love and die a little. Hopeful death!
Come scale these cliffs, lie changing, share this breath.


  

Musings at Giza
by Michael R. Burch

 
In deepening pools of shadows lies
the Sphinx, and men still fear his eyes.
Though centuries have passed, he waits.
Egyptians gather at the gates.
 

Great pyramids, the looted tombs
―how still and desolate their wombs!―
await sarcophagi of kings.
From eons past, a hammer rings.
 

Was Cleopatra's litter borne
along these streets now bleak, forlorn?
Did Pharaohs clad in purple ride
fierce stallions through a human tide?
 

Did Bocchoris here mete his law
from distant Kush to Saqqarah?
or Tutankhamen here once smile
upon the children of the Nile?
 

or Nefertiti ever rise
with wild abandon in her eyes
to gaze across this arid plain
and cry, “Great Isis, live again!”


 

Her Preference
by Michael R. Burch

 
Not for her the pale incandescence of dreams,
the warm glow of imagination,
the hushed whispers of possibility,
or frail, blossoming hope.
 

No, she prefers the anguish and screams
of bitter condemnation,
the hissing of hostility,
damnation's rope.


  

The Poet's Condition
by Michael R. Burch

 
The poet's condition
(bother tradition)
is whining contrition.
Supposedly sage,
 

his editor knows
his brain's in his toes
though he would suppose
to soon be the rage.
 

His readers are sure
his work's premature
or merely manure,
insipidly trite.
 

His mother alone
will answer the phone
(perhaps with a moan)
to hear him recite.


 

The Shape of Mourning
by Michael R. Burch

 
The shape of mourning
is an oiled creel
shining with unuse,
 

the bolt of cold steel
on a locker
shielding memory,

the monthly penance
of flowers,
the annual wake,
 

the face in the photograph
no longer dissolving under scrutiny,
becoming a keepsake,
 

the useless mower
lying forgotten
in weeds,
 

rings and crosses and
all the paraphernalia
the soul no longer needs.


 

Dancer
by Michael R. Burch

 
You will never change;
you range,
investing passion in the night,
waltzing through
a blinding blue,
immaculate and fabled light.

Do not despair
or wonder where
the others of your race have fled.
They left you here
to gin and beer
and won't return till you are bled

of fantasy
and piety,
of brewing passion like champagne,
of storming through
without a clue,
but finding answers fall like rain.

They left.
You laughed,
but now you sigh
for ages,
stages
slipping by.

You pause;
applause
is all you hear.
You dance,
askance,
as drunkards cheer.


 

Excerpts from the Journal of Dorian Gray
by Michael R. Burch

 
It was not so much dream, as error;
I lay and felt the creeping terror
of what I had become take hold . . .

The moon watched, silent, palest gold;
the picture by the mantle watched;
the clock upon the mantle talked,
in halting voice, of minute things . . .

Twelve strokes like lashes and their stings
scored anthems to my loneliness,
but I have dreamed of what is best,
and I have promised to be good . . .

Dismembered limbs in vats of wood,
foul acids, and a strangled cry!
I did not care, I watched him die . . .

Each lovely rose has thorns we miss;
they prick our lips, should we once kiss
their mangled limbs, or think to clasp
their violent beauty. Dream, aghast,
the flower of my loveliness,
this ageless face (for who could guess?),
and I will kiss you when I rise . . .

The patterns of our lives comprise
strange portraits. Mine, I fear,
proved dear indeed . . . Adieu!
The knife’s for you.

Another strange one, written after reading Wilde's macabre novella.

Love Unfolded Like a Flower
by Michael R. Burch

 
Love unfolded
like a flower;
Pale petals pinked and blushed to see the sky.
I came to know you
and to trust you
in moments lost to springtime slipping by.

Then love burst outward,
leaping skyward,
and untamed blossoms danced against the wind.
All I wanted
was to hold you;
though passion tempted once, we never sinned.

Now love's gay petals
fade and wither,
and winter beckons, whispering a lie.
We were friends,
but friendships end . . .
yes, friendships end and even roses die.


  

Doppelgänger
by Michael R. Burch

 
Here the only anguish
is the bedraggled vetch lying strangled in weeds,
the customary sorrows of the wild persimmons,
the whispered complaints of the stately willow trees
disentangling their fine lank hair,

and what is past.

I find you here, one of many things lost,
that, if we do not recover, will undoubtedly vanish forever ...
now only this unfortunate stone,
this pale, disintegrate mass,
this destiny, this unexpected shiver,

this name we share.

Old Pantaloons, a Chiasmus
by Michael R. Burch
 

Old pantaloons are soft and white,
prudent days, imprudent nights
when fingers slip through drawers to feel
that which they long most to steal.
 

Old panty loons are soft and white,
prudent days, imprudent nights
when fingers slip through drawers to steal
that which they long most to feel.

Burn

by Michael R. Burch

for Trump

Sunbathe,

ozone baby,

till your parched skin cracks

in the white-hot flash

of radiation.

Incantation

from your pale parched lips

shall not avail;

you made this hell.

Now burn.

This was one of my early poems, written around age 19. I dedicated the poem to Trump after he pulled the United States out of the Paris climate change accords. 

You Were My Death

by Paul Celan

loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

You were my death;

I could hold you

when everything abandoned me―

even breath.

O, little root of a dream
by Paul Celan
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
 

O, little root of a dream
you enmire me here;
I’m undermined by blood―
made invisible,
death’s possession.

Touch the curve of my face,
that there may yet be an earthly language of ardor,
that someone else’s eyes
may somehow still see me,
though I’m blind,
here where you
deny me voice.
 

Originally published by Bewildering Stories

Cædmon's Hymn (circa 658-680 AD)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Humbly now we honour heaven-kingdom's Guardian,
the Measurer's might and his mind-plans,
the goals of the Glory-Father. First he, the Everlasting Lord,
established earth's fearful foundations.
Then he, the First Scop, hoisted heaven as a roof
for the sons of men: Holy Creator,
mankind's great Maker! Then he, the Ever-Living Lord,
afterwards made men middle-earth: Master Almighty!

“Cædmon’s Hymn,” composed at the Monastery of Whitby (a North Yorkshire fishing village), is one of the oldest known poems written in the English language, dating back to around 680 A.D. According to legend, Cædmon, an illiterate Anglo-Saxon cowherd, received the gift of poetic composition from an angel; he subsequently founded a school of Christian poets. Unfortunately, only nine lines of Cædmon’s verse survive, in the writings of the Venerable Bede. Whitby, tiny as it is, reappears later in the history of English literature, having been visited, in diametric contrast, by Lewis Carroll and Bram Stoker’s ghoulish yet evocative Dracula.

At Cædmon’s Grave
by Michael R. Burch

At the monastery of Whitby,

on a day when the sun sank through the sea,
and the gulls shrieked wildly, jubilant, free,

while the wind and time blew all around,
I paced those dusk-enamored grounds
and thought I heard the steps resound

of Carroll, Stoker and good Bede
who walked there, too, their spirits freed
―perhaps by God, perhaps by need―

to write, and with each line, remember
the glorious light of Cædmon’s ember,
scorched tongues of flame words still engender.

Here, as darkness falls, at last we meet.
I lay this pale garland of words at his feet.

Originally published by The Lyric

Cædmon’s Face
by Michael R. Burch

At the monastery of Whitby,
on a day when the sun sank through the sea,
and the gulls shrieked wildly, jubilant, free,

while the wind and Time blew all around,
I paced that dusk-enamored ground
and thought I heard the steps resound

of Carroll, Stoker and good Bede
who walked here too, their spirits freed
―perhaps by God, perhaps by need―

to write, and with each line, remember
the glorious light of Cædmon’s ember:
scorched tongues of flame words still engender.

*

He wrote here in an English tongue,
a language so unlike our own,
unlike―as father unto son.

But when at last a child is grown.
his heritage is made well-known:
his father’s face becomes his own.

*
He wrote here of the Middle-Earth,
the Maker’s might, man’s lowly birth,
of every thing that God gave worth

suspended under heaven’s roof.
He forged with simple words His truth
and nine lines left remain the proof:

his face was Poetry’s, from youth.

Caveat
by Michael R. Burch

If only we were not so eloquent,
we might sing, and only sing, not to impress,
but only to enjoy, to be enjoyed.

We might inundate the earth with thankfulness
for light, although it dies, and make a song
of night descending on the earth like bliss,

with other lights beyond―not to be known―

but only to be welcomed and enjoyed,
before all worlds and stars are overthrown ...

as a lover’s hands embrace a sleeping face
and find it beautiful for emptiness
of all but joy. There is no thought to love

but love itself. How senseless to redress,
in darkness, such becoming nakedness . . .

Originally published by Clementine Unbound

Caveat Spender
by Michael R. Burch

It’s better not to speculate
"continually" on who is great.
Though relentless awe’s
a Célèbre Cause,
please reserve some time for the contemplation
of the perils of
EXAGGERATION.

The Beat Goes On (and On and On and On ...)
by Michael R. Burch

Bored stiff by his board-stiff attempts
at “meter,” I crossly concluded
I’d use each iamb
in lieu of a lamb,
bedtimes when I’m under-quaaluded.

Originally published by Grand Little Things

Ceremony

by Michael R. Burch

Lost in the cavernous blue silence of spring,

heavy-lidded and drowsy with slumber, I see

the dark gnats leap; the black flies fling

their slow, engorged bulks into the air above me.

Shimmering hordes of blue-green bottleflies sing

their monotonous laments; as I listen, they near

with the strange droning hum of their murmurous wings.

Though you said you would leave me, I prop you up here

and brush back red ants from your fine, tangled hair,

whispering, “I do!” . . . as the gaunt vultures stare.

Our English Rose
by Michael R. Burch

for Christine Ena Burch

The rose is�"
the ornament of the earth,
the glory of nature,
the archetype of the flowers,
the blush of the meadows,
a lightning flash of beauty.

This is my translation/interpretation of a Sappho epigram.

Children

by Michael R. Burch

There was a moment

suspended in time like a swelling drop of dew about to fall,

impendent, pregnant with possibility ...

when we might have made ...

anything, 

               anything we dreamed, 

                                                   almost anything at all,

coalescing dreams into reality.

Oh, the love we might have fashioned

out of a fine mist and the nightly sparkle of the cosmos

and the rhythms of evening!

But we were young,

and what might have been is now a dark abyss of loss

and what we have left is not worth saving.

But, oh, you were lovely,

child of the wild moonlight, attendant tides and doting stars,

and for a day ...

what little we partook

of all that lay before us seemed so much, 

                       and passion but a force

with which to play.

Dream House
by Michael R. Burch

I have come to the house of my fondest dreams,
but the shutters are boarded; the front door is locked;
the mail box leans over; and where we once walked,
the path is grown over with crabgrass and clover.

I kick the trash can; it screams, topples over.
The yard, weeded over, blooms white fluff, and green.
The elm we once swung from leans over the stream.
In the twilight I cling with both hands to the swing.

Inside, perhaps, I hear the telephone ring
or watch once again as the bleary-eyed mover
takes down your picture. Dejected, I hover,
asking over and over, “Why didn’t you love her?”

Confession

by Michael R. Burch

What shall I say to you, to confess,

words? Words that can never express

anything close to what I feel?

For words that seem tangible, real,

when I think them

become vaguely surreal when I put ink to them.

And words that I thought that I knew,

like "love" and "devotion"

never ring true.

While "passion"

sounds strangely like the latest fashion

or a perfume.

NOTE: At the time I wrote this poem, a perfume called Passion was in fashion. 

Ode to Postmodernism, or, Bury Me at St. Edmonds!
by Michael R. Burch

"Bury St. Edmonds―Amid the squirrels, pigeons, flowers and manicured lawns of Abbey Gardens, one can plug a modem into a park bench and check e-mail, files or surf the Web, absolutely free."―Tennessean News Service. (The bench was erected free of charge by the British division of MSN, after a local bureaucrat wrote a contest-winning ode of sorts to MSN.)

Our post-modernist-equipped park bench will let
you browse the World Wide Web, the Internet,
commune with nature, interact with hackers,
design a virus, feed brown bitterns crackers.

Discretely-wired phone lines lead to plugs―
four ports we swept last night for nasty bugs,
so your privacy's assured (a threesome's fine)
while invited friends can scan the party line:

for Internet alerts on new positions,
the randier exploits of politicians,
exotic birds on web cams (DO NOT FEED!) .
The cybersex is great, it's guaranteed

to leave you breathless―flushed, free of disease

and malware viruses. Enjoy the trees,
the birds, the bench―this product of Our pen.

We won in with an ode to MSN.

Love Has a Southern Flavor

by Michael R. Burch

Love has a Southern flavor: honeydew, 

ripe cantaloupe, the honeysuckle's spout

we tilt to basking faces to breathe out

the ordinary, and inhale perfume...

Love's Dixieland-rambunctious: tangled vines, 

wild clematis, the gold-brocaded leaves

that will not keep their order in the trees, 

unmentionables that peek from dancing lines...

Love cannot be contained, like Southern nights: 

the constellations' dying mysteries, 

the fireflies that hum to light, each tree's

resplendent autumn cape, a genteel sight...

Love also is as wild, as sprawling-sweet, 

as decadent as the wet leaves at our feet.

Published by The Lyric, Contemporary Sonnet, The Eclectic Muse, Better Than Starbucks, The Chained Muse, Setu (India) , Victorian Violet Press, A Long Story Short, Glass Facets of Poetry, Docster, Trinacria, PS: It's Poetry (anthology) , and in a Czech translation by Vaclav ZJ Pinkava

Our English Rose

by Michael R. Burch

for Christine Ena Burch

The rose is―

the ornament of the earth, 

the glory of nature, 

the archetype of the flowers, 

the blush of the meadows, 

a lightning flash of beauty.

This is my loose translation/interpretation of a Sappho epigram.

Departed

by Michael R. Burch 

Christ, how I miss you! , 

though your parting kiss is still warm on my lips.

Now the floor is not strewn with your stockings and slips

and the dishes are all stacked away.

You left me today...

and each word left unspoken now whispers regrets.

Describing You

by Michael R. Burch 

How can I describe you? 

The fragrance of morning rain

mingled with dew

reminds me of you; 

the warmth of sunlight

stealing through a windowpane

brings you back to me again.

This is an early poem of mine, written as a teenager.

This Distance Between Us

by Michael R. Burch 

This distance between us, 

this vast gulf of remembrance

void of understanding, 

sets us apart.

You are so far, 

lost child, 

weeping for consolation, 

so dear to my heart.

Once near to my heart, 

though seldom to touch, 

now you are foreign, 

now you grow faint...

like the wayward light of a vagabond star―

obscure, enigmatic.

Is the reveling gypsy

becoming a saint? 

Now loneliness, 

a broad expanse

―barren, forbidding―

whispers my name.

I, too, am a traveler

down this dark path, 

unsure of the footing, 

cursing the rain.

I, too, have felt pain, 

pain and the ache of passion unfulfilled, 

remorse, grief, and all the terrors

of the night.

And how very black

and how bleak my despair...

O, where are you, where are you

shining tonight? 

Confession

by Michael R. Burch 

What shall I say to you, to confess, 

words? Words that can never express

anything close to what I feel? 

For words that seem tangible, real, 

when I think them

become vaguely surreal when I put ink to them.

And words that I thought that I knew, 

like "love" and "devotion"

never ring true.

While "passion"

sounds strangely like the latest fashion

or a perfume.

NOTE: At the time I wrote this poem, a perfume named Passion was in fashion.

Consequence

by Michael R. Burch

They are fresh-faced, 

not innocent, but perhaps not yet jaded, 

oblivious to time and death, 

of each counted breath

in the pendulum's sway

falling unheeded.

They are bright, undissuaded

by foreign tongues, 

by sepulchers empty and waiting, 

by sarcophagi of ancient kings, 

by proclamations, 

by rituals of scalpels and rings.

They are sworn, they are fated

to misadventure and grief; 

but they revel in life

till the sun falls, receding

into silent halls

to torrents of inconsequential tears...

... to brief tragedies of tears

when they consider this: No one else sees.

But I know.

We all know.

We all know the consequence

of being so young.

Cycles

by Michael R. Burch 

I see his eyes caress my daughter's breasts

through her thin cotton dress, 

and how an indiscreet strap of her white bra

holds his bald fingers

in fumbling mammalian awe...

And I remember long cycles into the bruised dusk

of a distant park, 

hot blushes, 

wild, disembodied rushes of blood, 

portentous intrusions of lips, tongues and fingers...

and now in him the memory of me lingers

like something thought rancid, 

proved rotten.

I see Another again―hard, staring, and silent―

though long-ago forgotten...

And I remember conjectures of panty lines, 

brief flashes of white down bleacher stairs, 

coarse patches of hair glimpsed in bathroom mirrors, 

all the odd, questioning stares...

Yes, I remember it all now, 

and I shoo them away, 

willing them not to play too long or too hard

in the back yard―

with a long, ineffectual stare

that years from now, he may suddenly remember.

Dancer

by Michael R. Burch 

You will never change; 

you range, 

investing passion in the night, 

waltzing through

a blinding blue, 

immaculate and fabled light.

Do not despair

or wonder where

the others of your race have fled.

They left you here

to gin and beer

and won't return till you are bled

of fantasy

and piety, 

of brewing passion like champagne, 

of storming through

without a clue, 

but finding answers fall like rain.

They left.

You laughed, 

but now you sigh

for ages, 

stages

slipping by.

You pause; 

applause

is all you hear.

You dance, 

askance, 

as drunkards cheer.

Daredevil

by Michael R. Burch 

There are days that I believe

(and nights that I deny) 

love is not mutilation.

Daredevil, dry your eyes.

There are tightropes leaps bereave―

taut wires strumming high

brief songs, infatuations.

Daredevil, dry your eyes.

There were cannon shots' soirees, 

hearts barricaded, wise...

and then... annihilation.

Daredevil, dry your eyes.

There were nights our hearts conceived

dawns' indiscriminate sighs.

To dream was our consolation.

Daredevil, dry your eyes.

There were acrobatic leaves

that tumbled down to lie

at our feet, bright trepidations.

Daredevil, dry your eyes.

There were hearts carved into trees―

tall stakes where you and I

left childhood's salt libations...

Daredevil, dry your eyes.

Where once you scraped your knees; 

love later bruised your thighs.

Death numbs all, our sedation.

Daredevil, dry your eyes.

Dark Twin

by Michael R. Burch

You come to me

out of the sun―

my dark twin, unreal...

And you are always near

although I cannot touch you; 

although I trample you, you cannot feel...

And we cannot be parted, 

nor can we ever meet

except at the feet.

Damp Days

by Michael R. Burch

These are damp days, 

and the earth is slick and vile

with the smell of month-old mud.

And yet it seldom rains; 

a never-ending drizzle

drenches spring's bright buds

till they droop as though in death.

Now Time

drags out His endless hours

as though to bore to tears

His fretting, edgy servants

through the sheer length of His days

and slow passage of His years.

Damp days are His domain.

Irritation

grinds the ravaged nerves

and grips tight the gorging brain

which fills itself, through sense, 

with vast seas of soggy clay

while the temples throb in pain

at the thought of more damp days.

I believe I wrote the first version of this poem around age 16, or so.

Fairest Diana

by Michael R. Burch 

Fairest Diana, princess of dreams, 

born to be loved and yet distant and lone, 

why did you linger―so solemn, so lovely―

an orchid ablaze in a crevice of stone? 

Was not your heart meant for tenderest passions? 

Surely your lips―for wild kisses, not vows! 

Why then did you languish, though lustrous, becoming

a pearl of enchantment cast before sows? 

Fairest Diana, as fragile as lilac, 

as willful as rainfall, as true as the rose; 

how did a stanza of silver-bright verse

come to be bound in a book of dull prose? 

Contraire

by Michael R. Burch

Where there was nothing

but emptiness

and hollow chaos and despair, 

I sought Her...

finding only the darkness

and mournful silence

of the wind entangling her hair.

Yet her name was like prayer.

Now she is the vast

starry tinctures of emptiness

flickering everywhere

within me and about me.

Yes, she is the darkness, 

and she is the silence

of twilight and the night air.

Yes, she is the chaos

and she is the madness

and they call her Contraire.

Disconcerted

by Michael R. Burch

Meg, my sweet, 

fresh as a daisy, 

when I'm with you

my heart beats like crazy

& my future gets hazy...

Earthbound
by Michael R. Burch

Tashunka Witko, better known as Crazy Horse, had a vision of a red-tailed hawk at Sylvan Lake, South Dakota. In his vision he saw himself riding a spirit horse, flying through a storm, as the hawk flew above him, shrieking. When he awoke, a red-tailed hawk was perched near his horse.

Earthbound,
and yet I now fly
through the clouds that are aimlessly drifting ...
so high
that no sound
echoing by
below where the mountains are lifting
the sky
can be heard.

Like a bird,
but not meek,
like a hawk from a distance regarding its prey,
I will shriek,
not a word,
but a screech,
and my terrible clamor will turn them to clay―"

the sheep,
the earthbound.

In October 1838 the Cherokees began to walk the "Trail of Tears." Most of them made the thousand mile journey west to Oklahoma on foot. An estimated 4,000 people, or a quarter of the tribe, died en route. The soldiers "escorting" the Cherokees at bayonet point refused permission for the dead to be buried, threatening to shoot anyone who disobeyed. So the living were forced to carry the corpses of the dead until camp was made for the night.

US Verse, after Auden

by Michael R. Burch

“Let the living creature lie,

Mortal, guilty, but to me

The entirely beautiful.”

Verse has small value in our Unisphere,

nor is it fit for windy revelation.

It cannot legislate less taxing fears;

it cannot make us, several, a nation.

Enumerator of our sins and dreams,

it pens its cryptic numbers, and it sings,

a little quaintly, of the ways of love.

(It seems of little use for lesser things.)

Published by The Raintown Review, The Barefoot Muse and Poetry Life & Times

The Unisphere mentioned is a spherical stainless steel representation of the earth constructed for the 1964 New York World’s Fair. It was commissioned to celebrate the beginning of the space age and dedicated to "Man's Achievements on a Shrinking Globe in an Expanding Universe." The lines quoted in the epigraph are from W. H. Auden’s love poem “Lullaby.”

Free Fall (II)

by Michael R. Burch

I have no earthly remembrance of you, as if

we were never of earth, but merely white clouds adrift,

swirling together through Himalayan serene altitudes�"

no more man and woman than exhaled breath�"unable to fall

back to solid existence, despite the air’s sparseness: all

our being borne up, because of our lightness,

toward the sun’s unendurable brightness . . .

But since I touched you, fire consumes each wing!

We who are unable to fly, stall

contemplating disaster. Despair like an anchor, like an iron ball,

heavier than ballast, sinks on its thick-looped chain

toward the earth, and soon thereafter there will be sufficient pain

to recall existence, to make the coming darkness everlasting.

Elemental
by Michael R. Burch

There is within her a welling forth
of love unfathomable.
She is not comfortable
with the thought of merely loving:
but she must give all.

At night, she heeds the storm's calamitous call;
nay, longs for it. Why?
O, if a man understood, he might understand her.
But that never would do!
Darling, as you embrace the storm,

so I embrace elemental you.

Every Man Has a Dream
by Michael R. Burch

Every man has a dream that he cannot quite touch ...
a dream of contentment, of soft, starlit rain,
of a breeze in the evening that, rising again,
reminds him of something that cannot have been,
and he calls this dream love.

And each man has a dream that he fears to let live,
for he knows: to succumb is to throw away all.
So he curses, denies it and locks it within
the cells of his heart and he calls it a sin,
this madness, this love.

But each man in his living falls prey to his dreams,
and he struggles, but so he ensures that he falls,
and he finds in the end that he cannot deny
the joy that he feels or the tears that he cries
in the darkness of night for this light he calls love.

Flight
by Michael R. Burch

Eagle, raven, blackbird, crow . . .
What you are I do not know.
Where you go I do not care.
I’m unconcerned whose meal you bear.
But as you mount the sunlit sky,
I only wish that I could fly.
I only wish that I could fly.

Robin, hawk or whippoorwill . . .
Should men care that you hunger still?
I do not wish to see your home.
I do not wonder where you roam.
But as you scale the sky's bright stairs,
I only wish that I were there.
I only wish that I were there.

Sparrow, lark or chickadee . . .
Your markings I disdain to see.
Where you fly concerns me not.
I scarcely give your flight a thought.
But as you wheel and arc and dive,
I, too, would feel so much alive.
I, too, would feel so much alive.

This is a poem that I believe I wrote as a high school sophomore. But it could have been written a bit later. I seem to remember the original poem being influenced by William Cullen Bryant's "To a Waterfowl."

130 Refuted

by Michael R. Burch

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun; 

Coral is far more red than her lips' red; 

―Shakespeare, Sonnet 130

Seas that sparkle in the sun

without its light would have no beauty; 

but the light within your eyes

is theirs alone; it owes no duty.

And their kindled flame, not half as bright, 

is meant for me, and brings delight.

Coral formed beneath the sea, 

though scarlet-tendriled, cannot warm me; 

while your lips, not half so red, 

just touching mine, at once inflame me.

And the searing flames your lips arouse

fathomless oceans fail to douse.

Bright roses' brief affairs, declared

when winter comes, will wither quickly.

Your cheeks, though paler when compared

with them?―more lasting, never prickly.

And your cheeks, though wan, so warm, 

far vaster treasures, need no thorns.

Originally published by Romantics Quarterly. I wrote this poem as a teenager, after reading Shakespeare's sonnet 130 and having "issues" with it.