God made me into a marionette
He pulled me from the dust
He scooped me out of coals.
He breathed life into my belly
and now they call me animated earth.
He carved my bones from alabaster stones
long buried under piles of pine needles and leaves
He sang songs of Light and Life
and put them in my ears
and taught me all the words
and cut me silver keys.
now i stand up tall
like the Lighthouse of Alexandria
or the Colossus of Rhodes
i take showers under jungle waterfalls
full of orchid petals
and with angel fish climbing up the rock walls.
my head and all my limbs are hanging by
golden silken strings and threads
and where I walk the moss and lichens grow.
He fashioned my eyes from glass
blown over the hot geysers
and sulfur springs
of thermopylae
and the salt basin dunes.
He plucked my pupils from the pregnant blackness
of the Void.
He struck them over steel and flint
and the sparks made it bright enough to see.
my heart is a time-piece
keeping minutes with its beats
like a great shadow cast behind a sphere.
the elements once kept me apart from me my identity,
I was a hungry ghost
walking around town like a hypodermic voodoo doll.
everytime I turned around
I tripped over another basket full of rattlesnakes
hissing from both ends.
I gave up and crossed my heart
and gave it over to the chemical egregore
hoping I would die while somehow staying alive
and learning how to fly away home-
so i could leave all the piles of ashes and teeth alone
and maybe plant a rose garden.

but God made of me a marionette
strung me up from strings of silken gold.
He breathes for me,
and dances me to the music of the spheres
and now the whole planet is a
Hanging Garden of the Fallen Babylon
and now I keep snakes
as exotic pets
and as company
when i’m lonely
and for afternoon tea.

Mother of Cowards
by Michael R. Burch aka "The Loyal Opposition"

So unlike the brazen giant of Greek fame
With conquering limbs astride from land to land,
Spread-eagled, showering gold, a strumpet stands:
A much-used trollop with a torch, whose flame
Has long since been extinguished. And her name?
"Mother of Cowards!" From her enervate hand
Soft ash descends. Her furtive eyes demand
Allegiance to her ****'s repulsive game.

"Keep, ancient lands, your wretched poor!" cries she
With scarlet lips. "Give me your hale, your whole,
Your huddled tycoons, yearning to be pleased!
The wretched refuse of your toilet hole?
Oh, never send one unwashed child to me!
I await Trump's pleasure by the gilded bowl!"

NOTE: My sonnet is a parody of the famous poem "The New Colossus" written about the Statue of Liberty by Emma Lazarus. Keywords/Tags: America, American history, liberty, United States, Emma Lazarus, The New Colossus, Statue of Liberty, Lady Liberty, torch, freedom, beacon, lamp, light, door, golden door, liberty, immigrants, immigration, refuse, homeless, poor, rich, discrimination, huddled masses, yearning, breath free, giant, fame, free, freedom of speech, independence day, New York, patriotic

The old champion bows her head and drops her torch.
Fatigue has set in after a century of drudgery
And all her commitment shown, no one can question her decision.
Her partisans are bleak and sympathetic
For how long should they ask the weary warrior to keep standing?
The new masses turned away and the poor exiled under law of phylogeny,
There is now no beacon but a rickety fence creakin’
That children fear when blows the old wind, once called freedom.

I am statue
Standing guard
A silent sentinel
Slowly slipping
In to madness
Patience
My prized virtue
Has left me
Blind
I can't see
Broken
In pain
Screaming in my head
In vain
Be still my bleeding heart
I don't have much left