#tomb
In times I feel like I can’t breathe
Like I’m under water. It holds me.
I can’t get up with help. Slowly falling to the bottom.
The surface fades, a dying gleam,
The phantom of a waking dream.
The currents weave a liquid shroud,
Where silences cry out aloud,
And shadows drink my final breath,
In this, the cold, abyss of death.
No angel’s hand shall pierce the gloom,
To save me from this restless tomb;
The tide above may crash and weep,
But I am wedded to the deep.
Forever bound, forever still,
To suit a dark, unyielding will,
Where ancient horrors softly creep,
And pull my soul to endless sleep.
I am not here. I am dead. Although I cannot perceive this in my own mind, I can feel it.
May 19
May 19, 2026 at 6:41 PM UTC
Sins, bites on your conscience
never to your convenience.
No salvation, No revelations.
Unblessed the lucky
bottomless becomes your destiny
and darkness laments, it’s quite cloudy
wavy timelines, weary crimes
Brooking our doom
creating thy tomb
as deaths looms.
Apr 20, 2024
Apr 20, 2024 at 2:17 AM UTC
So falls Greece, so falls Rome,
And in their bone-lipped tombs
Forever those still listening for love.
Jan 10, 2022
Jan 10, 2022 at 2:00 PM UTC
These are my modern English translations of sonnets by the French poet Stephane Mallarme.
The Tomb of Edgar Poe
by Stéphane Mallarmé
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Transformed into himself by Death, at last,
the Bard unsheathed his Art’s recondite blade
to duel with dullards, blind & undismayed,
who’d never heard his ardent Voice, aghast!
Like dark Medusan demons of the past
who’d failed to heed such high, angelic words,
men called him bendered, his ideas absurd,
discounting all the warlock’s spells he’d cast.
The wars of heaven and hell? Earth’s senseless grief?
Can sculptors carve from myths a bas-relief
to illuminate the sepulcher of Poe?
No, let us set in granite, here below,
a limit and a block on this disaster:
this Blasphemy, to not acknowledge a Master!
The original French poem appears after the translations
"Le Cygne" ("The Swan")
by Stéphane Mallarmé
this untitled poem is also called Mallarmé's "White Sonnet"
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
The virginal, the vivid, the vivacious day:
can its brilliance be broken by a wild wing-blow
delivered to this glacial lake
whose frozen ice-falls impede flight? No.
In past reflections on its thoughts today
the Swan remembers freedom, but can’t make
a song from its surroundings, only take
on the winter's ghostly hue of snow.
In the Swan's white agony its bared neck lies
within a guillotine its sense denies.
Slowly being frozen to its inner being,
the body ignores the phantom spirit fleeing...
Cold contempt for its captor
is of no use to the raptor.
***
Le tombeau d’Edgar Poe
by Stéphane Mallarmé
Tel qu’en Lui-même enfin l’éternité le change,
Le Poète suscite avec un glaive nu
Son siècle épouvanté de n’avoir pas connu
Que la mort triomphait dans cette voix étrange!
Eux, comme un vil sursaut d’hydre oyant jadis l’ange
Donner un sens plus pur aux mots de la tribu,
Proclamèrent très haut le sortilège bu
Dans le flot sans honneur de quelque noir mélange.
Du sol et de la nue hostiles, ô grief!
Si notre idée avec ne sculpte un bas-relief
Dont la tombe de Poe éblouissante s’orne
Calme bloc ici-bas chu d’un désastre obscur
Que ce granit du moins montre à jamais sa borne
Aux noirs vols du Blasphème épars dans le futur.
***
Le Cygne
by Stéphane Mallarmé
Le vierge, le vivace et le bel aujourd'hui
Va-t-il nous déchirer avec un coup d'aile ivre
Ce lac dur oublié que hante sous le givre
Le transparent glacier des vols qui n'ont pas fui !
Un cygne d'autrefois se souvient que c'est lui
Magnifique mais qui sans espoir se délivre
Pour n'avoir pas chanté la région où vivre
Quand du stérile hiver a resplendi l'ennui.
Tout son col secouera cette blanche agonie
Par l'espace infligée à l'oiseau qui le nie,
Mais non l'horreur du sol où le plumage est pris.
Fantôme qu'à ce lieu son pur éclat assigne,
Il s'immobilise au songe froid de mépris
Que vêt parmi l'exil inutile le Cygne.
Stephane Mallarme was a major French poet and one of the leading French symbolist poets.
Keywords/Tags: Stephane Mallarme, France, French poet, symbolism, symbolist, symbolic, poetry, Edgar Allan Poe, grave, tomb, sepulcher, memorial, elegy, eulogy, epitaph, sonnet
Dec 18, 2021
Dec 18, 2021 at 2:55 AM UTC
I had a dream of you and I,
layin' on a dead poet's tomb
playing our song, watchin' the stars
and wishing one would fall into us.
Feb 27, 2021
Feb 27, 2021 at 5:07 AM UTC
-A Psalm Of Johnson Regarding How To Get Saved
Because all have sinned and strayed away from God's path,
We are all deserving of his perfectly just wrath.
But God instead sent his equal to die in our place,
Because he is infinitely full of love and grace.
So in order to escape from your eternal doom,
You must believe God raised Christ from the dead in his tomb!
Dec 25, 2020
Dec 25, 2020 at 1:33 AM UTC
'tomb-tomb-tomb-tomb-tomb...'
Sound of the generator
Weak light leaves the bulb
Fed into the darkness
I calm my timid heart
; 'womb-womb—womb-—womb'
Nov 11, 2020
Nov 11, 2020 at 5:34 PM UTC
I have laid down my life as I laid down my gun
the battle is over
I don't know who won
their side our side
does anyone care when it's all said and done?
Long ago and far away
at very the end of the hardest day
when silence falls on the blood red, mud red, grass
will anyone remember what came to pass?
Young men die and old men weep
for comrades lost and the memories they keep
hugged to themselves till their time is done
a long life haunted by the shadow of the gun.
I have no name
war took it from me
a symbol, instead of the lad I used to be
Oct 19, 2020
Oct 19, 2020 at 5:42 AM UTC
My torch light glints off the shiny orange gem, that lies next to my friend Jim,
The poor ******* picked it up before he could flea, and now I feel it pull towards me,
The radiating heat is so soft and sweet I can feel my feet shuffling towards ultimate defeat.
As I reach down to pluck it up, the first feel of it is such a rush.
The power of it is to great, I'm going to faint my soul is no longer mine to hold and cherish it resides within the gem, now I'm with my true friend Jim.
Oct 18, 2020
Oct 18, 2020 at 3:49 AM UTC
Even though I wasn't dead,
people prayed silently
at my tomb stone.
Jun 6, 2020
Jun 6, 2020 at 3:49 PM UTC
bleak times as all fall
warriors ebb differently
obscured within sheets
Apr 17, 2020
Apr 17, 2020 at 5:15 PM UTC
Chest heaving, eyes weeping,
The tomb blurs before my eyes.
How is everyone else still sleeping
When my Savior doesn’t arise?
Oh, how the doubt roars within me,
His words now seem to me as His rotting flesh,
“I will rise on day three,”
But his body is now stolen, unless…
Dirt clenching onto my dress,
I fling the tears from my eyes,
Trying to decide if… Yes!
There are people by his graveside.
Angels they must be, all in white,
And before I can confirm their existence, they speak:
“Woman, why are you weeping at this sight?”
My anger flares as I try to control my speech.
“Because my Lord has been taken away,
And I don’t know where his body is.”
I attempt to keep my temper at bay,
Turning away to abate my boiling fears.
Then I see the gardener, and a flash of brilliance
Or desperation rises in me, which one I don’t know,
But as I open my mouth to ask about my Lord’s disappearance,
He speaks: “Why are you weeping woman, why such sorrow?”
Again the same question, yet I cannot form
An adequate response; how can one describe
The loss of Him who can calm the storm,
But now has left my world in turmoil at his sacrifice?
My anger reaches the heavens now,
And in irritation I retort, “If you have taken Him away,
Tell me where He is, and I will take him from thou.”
Chest heaving, eyes weeping, I glance away.
But then I hear my name, soft and sweet but firm,
Two syllables, a clear “Mary!”
And I turn
And my unbridled joy at seeing him turns into “Rabboni!”
I ponder for a second what it’s like to feel
Sadness, for in that split second, it’s gone,
It’s been replaced by rejoicing and zeal,
And I resist the urge to leap with the dawn.
How could I have ever doubted?
Of course His words are true,
It’s a reality that must be shouted,
Yet all I can do is stare at him now that he’s in my view.
“Do not cling to me,” he says earnestly
“For I still must ascend to my Father,
And please tell our friends this, for certainly
I ascend to My God and your God, My Father and your Father.”
It was good he said this, for I had forgotten
In my excitement to see my Savior; I’m sure
His disciples must have wondered whether their Lord had rotted:
“I’m leaving right now, my Savior!”
Sandals rubbing into callouses, lungs heaving,
I ran back to town, through the streets that
Once knew me in despair, grieving,
Hardly stopping, for I had no time to chat.
My Savior has risen, he is alive and well,
He has saved us lost sheep who have gone astray,
And although He no longer on Earth will dwell,
He will never allow us to fully decay.
I’m sure when you die he will call your name too,
With a voice soft and sweet but firm and so true,
And you will go be with Him and He’ll make you brand-new,
And we’ll all live forever from our own Easter morning, too.
Apr 10, 2020
Apr 10, 2020 at 5:16 PM UTC
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.
Keywords/Tags: doppelganger, namesake, twin, lookalike, grave, tomb, headstone, inscription, weeds, shiver, recognition, destiny, fate
Apr 8, 2020
Apr 8, 2020 at 5:47 AM UTC
Love is her Belief and her Commandment
by Michael R. Burch
for Beth
Love is her belief and her commandment;
in restless dreams at night, she dreams of Love;
and Love is her desire and her purpose;
and everywhere she goes, she sings of Love.
There is a tomb in Palestine: for others
the chance to stake their claims (the Chosen Ones),
but in her eyes, it’s Love’s most hallowed chancel
where Love was resurrected, where one comes
in wondering awe to dream of resurrection
to blissful realms, where Love reigns over all
with tenderness, with infinite affection.
While some may mock her faith, still others wonder
because they see the rare state of her soul,
and there are rumors: when she prays the heavens
illume more brightly, as if saints concur
who keep a constant vigil over her.
And once she prayed beside a dying woman:
the heavens opened and the angels came
in the form of long-departed friends and loved ones,
to comfort and encourage. I believe
not in her God, but always in her Love.
Keywords/Tags: Love, God, belief, commandment, faith, desire, purpose, tomb, resurrection, soul, heaven, heavens, saints, vigil, angels, tenderness, affection
Apr 7, 2020
Apr 7, 2020 at 11:44 PM UTC
The Gardener’s Roses
by Michael R. Burch
Mary Magdalene, supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, “Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away.”
I too have come to the cave;
within: strange, half-glimpsed forms
and ghostly paradigms of things.
Here, nothing warms
this lightening moment of the dawn,
pale tendrils spreading east.
And I, of all who followed Him,
by far the least . . .
The women take no note of me;
I do not recognize
the men in white, the gardener,
these unfamiliar skies . . .
Faint scent of roses, then—a touch!
I turn, and I see: You.
My Lord, why do You tarry here:
Another waits, Whose love is true?
Although My Father waits, and bliss;
though angels call—ecstatic crew!—
I gathered roses for a Friend.
I waited here, for You.
NOTE: I do not believe in Jesus as a “sacrifice” to a primitive “god” who demands the blood of innocents in order to “forgive” sins of his own making through a ghoulish "atonement." But I will not completely discount the hope that love can transcend death, although, like Thomas, I will have to see it to believe it. Keywords/Tags: Jesus, Christ, cave, grave, tomb, gardener, roses, angels, resurrection, Mary, Magdalene, love, heaven
Mar 21, 2020
Mar 21, 2020 at 5:44 AM UTC
Does memory deserve such a platter?
Cellophane instead of silver, but still
An impressive tower.
Such weight it bears—
Exhibit of blue curiosities
Resting on shoulders,
Original honeycombs.
The honeyeater feasts
On what has made a meal of me.
Grand rooms echo with silence.
Love turned to hate
So often without comment.
A history of broken hearts lies beneath
Street level. Away from sun’s glare
I buried them.
It is a tomb I walk in, tour guide
To myself. It is an ossuary hidden deep
Underground. It is the Catacombs of Paris.
Here moldering in the dark repose
A stack of secret skulls and bones—
Those gleeful arsonists.
In the end, even they succumbed
To the fires they set,
Burning down chapels without regret.
The city rumbles overhead, oblivious.
Everyone is absorbed with their own busyness.
No one pauses to wonder outside the still museum.
The cool façade belies the treasures hidden within.
They forget the history we share.
No visitor ascends the stair.
Inside, all is quiet.
The sole curator walks among the artifacts—
The rare objects, a Gordian knot,
The personas we once wore:
The naked emperor, the femme fatale,
The honeycunt.
Nov 15, 2019
Nov 15, 2019 at 8:30 PM UTC
A repost:
A Roman poem written before The birth of Christ, inspired the title Gone With The wind
with Scarlett and Rhett Butler
But here you see only old
confessions of a man's true love for his beloved who is all gone
-Or-
(Or a woman's true love for
her beloved runner wishing she could have chased.)
~~~
CYNAR*A.
~~~~~
Last night yesternight, betwixt her lips and mine
There fell thy shadow, Cynara! Thy breath was shed
Upon my soul between the kisses and the wine;
And I was desolate and sick of an old passion,
Yea, I was desolate and bowed my head:
I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion.
All night upon mine heart I felt her warm heart beat,
Night-long within mine arms in love and sleep she lay;
Surely the kisses of her bought red mouth were sweet;
But I was desolate and sick of an old passion,
When I awoke and found the dawn was grey:
I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion.
I have forgot much, Cynara! Gone with the wind,
Flung roses, roses riotously with the throng,
Dancing, to put thy pale, lost lilies out of mind
But I was desolate and sick of an old passion,
Yea, all the time, because the dance was long:
I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion.
I cried for madder music and for stronger wine,
But when the feast is finished and the lamps expire,
Then falls thy shadow, Cynara! The night is thine;
And I am desolate and sick of an old passion,
Yea, hungry for the lips of my desire:
I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion.
~~~~~~~
By:Ernest Dowson
For:RhettlvScarlet.
to honor Karijinbba
in her great loss and healing
of her memory chip.
~~~~~~
Copy Rights.
~~~~
Ernest Dowson (1867-1900) died of alcoholism at the age of 32. His downward spiral began at age 23 when he fell for an 11 year old girl who would spurn him at 14 when he proposed marriage.
The following year, in 1894 his father died from an overdose. Dowson's mother
hanged herself within a year of her husband's death.
Soon after this dual tragedy Dowson left for France before returning back to England in 1897. Curiously he lived with the family of his unrequited love. Penniless, heartbroken and filling the empty voids in his life with alcohol, Dowson would spend the last six weeks of his life in the cottage of the Oscar Wilde biographer Robert Sherard who had found him
drunk in a bar.
Speaking of Oscar Wilde, he wrote after Dowson's death of a,"Poor wounded wonderful fellow that he was, a tragic reproduction of all tragic poetry, like a symbol, or a scene.
I hope bay leaves will be laid on his tomb and rue and myrtle too for he knew what true love
unrequieted love was."
~~~~~
Oct 22, 2018
Oct 22, 2018 at 12:44 AM UTC
a
poem is
a pharaoh's tomb:
the i interred in immortality.
Jul 6, 2019
Jul 6, 2019 at 8:29 AM UTC
What's the point of it all
learning to rise
yet then again fall.
Falling into the abyss
the clutches of hell.
Until I've had enough
of this cold, dark well.
Sick of the gloom, doom in this tomb
I cast off my doubt.
I feel my fiery soul
burning its way out.
Made my choice to burn bright
igniting the light with in.
Knowing that when I fall
darkness will beckon me again.
It is my decision to embrace defeat,
to quit or stay down,
or rise to my feet
regaining my crown.
Jun 30, 2019
Jun 30, 2019 at 10:16 PM UTC
When she was but a child,
she built a man-made shell;
And there she would retreat,
on her many trips to Hell.
~
No animosity or strife,
did ever reside there;
She was at peace within it,
no expectations or cares.
~
She felt peaceful and secure,
as she rid herself of the Beast;
Who tortured her, every night,
before she went to sleep.
~
There was no chance for escaping,
for it came without a sound;
And in the quiet of the night,
her teardrops hit the ground.
~
At least she had her tomb,
a place where no one came;
If not for her safe place to hide,
she might have gone insane!
Apr 22, 2019
Apr 22, 2019 at 1:09 PM UTC
(not ringing)
Bringing shrill
in a sense vacuum
a violence
Mewing, gut string taut
shock shell
instrument strung
along the centre of a tester tube
Abused sense-fully
with over leaden silence
packed tomb
vacuum
provision tank
a violence
Violin
waves
admin crowding
crowning grin
audience of labcoaters
a tinny able
a stint completed in this pressure test
out come;
all fists and winning
soldier born
a re-spun sinner
Mar 31, 2019
Mar 31, 2019 at 10:53 PM UTC
I scream, inside the tomb
--
they placed the bomb
---
that used to beat and left it rot
----
wondering what was the cause
----
of such a breakdown.
Mar 25, 2019
Mar 25, 2019 at 4:34 PM UTC