You came again
With his shroud
Your hunger and pain
I could see and love
In his mouth
Asking me to
Love those eyes and face
You offered a tulip, with a bow
After you lift your countenance
We walk hand in hand, ashore

i play a song
full of dissonant chords
but i won't stop
until the last note

because maybe
someone needs to hear a song

Editor's Notes
by Michael R. Burch

Eat, drink and be merry
(tomorrow, be contrary).

(***** and complain
in bad refrain,
but please—not till I'm on the plane.)

Write no poem before its time
(in your case, this means never).
Linger over every word
(by which, I mean forever).

By all means, read your verse aloud.
I'm sure you'll be a star
(and just as distant, when I'm gone);
your poems are beauteous (afar).

Keywords/Tags: editor, notes, refrain, recite, distance, distant, afar, star, poet, poems

My notes are full of conversations I never had

Not with you,



They contain words unspoken and unheard

But definitely felt



I wonder if you knew they were there

I wanted you to



I wonder if you could read them  

On my face



When I’d cry at night next to you

Did you hear?



Did you choose to ignore the hurt

You caused?



Was it easier for you to pretend  

I was the problem?



I wonder if your disillusion caused you  

To see me as happy

  

If you saw my notes you’d know

I wasn’t.

Not even close.

The breeze steals unsung notes
off aching branches. The tree
agonizes writing scores.

Poems in the
margins of books

Sketches of a
flying animal
caught halfway

Someone told me you're still pretty
you still wear your 20's in your 30's
bite your nails when angsty
and stutter when jittery

Someone told me you still fly
making the earth your sky
falling out of being shy
into living a different reality

Someone told me you still cry
when you're feeling, everything really...
turning your cheeks red with salty tears
chafing childhood from baby cheeks

Someone told me you...still...

I.
my friendship is yellow

my friendship is being your favorite color


II.
you are falling and you don’t realize until you hit the bottom and your fingernails have dirt underrate them from digging and digging because your skin has been white-hot burning for so long the air against your skin as you free fall felt like relief


III.
and i know i was alive once because i can still hear ocean waves crashing in my ears


IV.
flickering embers 

distorted by ***** wine glasses

you aren’t here

but i’m starting to think you never were


V.
through the swaying leaves of almost-summer,

not yet humid but enough to wear your favorite green sandals,

enough where you are not yet care-free,

but you can almost taste it

like strawberry juices dripping down your chin