Love, when we break up, I'll be fine
I'll cry an ocean and go sailing-
I'll turn the page and write a song.
I'll miss you, when you cross the line.

Pray, don't try to charter my course,
I'm only missing things which never came to pass
You're the one I wanted for forever,
I tell the waves, the fish. Laying on my skiff,
Crying stardust, dry and stinging
Reminiscing

But don't worry about me, I'll be fine
I miss the way you said your dreams were mine
I miss the smell of snow and melting in the kitchen together,
I miss summer flowers, afternoon showers,
Empty highways, when your dreams were mine,
I wonder if they ask you about me..
But I'll be fine.
I'll be fine.

my head is full of noise
you were my very first
trauma bond friend

our blood runs the same river
that cuts
the Everest between us now

i wanted peace in time
you wanted
picket fences and to color in the lines
you worry bout me
but i see the cuts on both your hands
the white paint on your clothes
whatever spirit in your eyes
flew somewhere else that you don't know about
i'd sew you a black wool coat
to match mine

but my life won't make much sense to you
with your hamster wheels and lists to do
and i'm scared
that we're running
out of time

There is something about the cute brunette,
With long lustrous brown hair over one shoulder,
It is like the common brown sparrow that winters over,
So rare and so mundane,
Like the surviving American chestnut tree Dutch disease has not slain.
And in the branches I look closer, in weather that numbs me,
The sparrow, fine face, elegant and comely,
The hawks would not feud with her
Lips, glossed with deadly berry of winter-juniper.
I want to  kiss her ,as if a hungry chick in winter,
And such bliss, watching talons miss,
Brown hair parted mid air chasing off hawk as she babysits.

With long boots, and chestnut hair over the shoulder,
Such a *****, a rarity--as I look closer,
this brunette beauty that winters over.

If you were to only see
the light from the flames dancing
on my face could you believe it was yours and feel unmoored for awhile?

More meaningless questions
to explore.

Undone or undoing?
In the sky or at the movies?

Kith and kin.

Ghosts.

Wind and windows.

Smoke.

Did slipping show us when to
slide?
Did mystery steer the misery to rhyme?
Did Odin limp after?

Meaningless questions.

First and Last
by Michael R. Burch

for Beth

You are the last arcane rose
of my aching,
my longing,
or the first yellowed leaves’
vagrant spirals of gold
forming huddled bright sheaves.
You are passion forsaking
dark skies, as though sunsets no winds might enclose.

And still in my arms
you are gentle and fragrant—
demesne of my vigor,
spent rigor,
lost power,
fallen musculature of youth,
leaves clinging and hanging,
nameless joys of my youth to this last lingering hour.

Published by Tucumcari Literary Review and Poetry Life & Times.
Keywords/Tags: rose, love, ache, desire, longing, passion, autumn, leaves, clinging, hanging, sunset, lost, youth, joy, joys, yellowed, golden, first, last, final

I awoke because fireflies buzzed in my lungs.
And I didn’t dare open my lips, lest the light spill from inside in a deluge of meaningless stuttering sentences that would never accurately explain the love I felt.
Instead it filled my chest,
molten gold pressing against my ribcage,
and I breathed as well as I could through the honeyed glow as I watched you sleep.
This was my favorite of their many faces:
no boisterous mask, no fire laced beneath their words, flames built to comfort or burn or blaze bright, blinding.
Without their mask, they seemed… human

Without their mask, they were beautiful.

It was a sunny afternoon
You identify what is new with me,
I was in puzzle, unable to internalize
“What new you talks about”?
Then you underline on my notebook ‘
Put a margin remarks,
It is different here
Appreciate ‘humanize dimension of nature’
Be careful
“Do not replaced nature from the frame
Never forget about identity of culture rooted in nature! “

That’s you are, a curator of younger
And Pater for many one!
I know you become tired
In the long journey of loving and living!
I know you become aide-de-camp
By rapturing of your beloved one!
I know you want to go for a long sleep
  Please take rest in peace!
We will run-through the practices of curatorship for young
But not for incubation!