#tracks
Tracks in the frost behind the shed
my rabbits quiet in their wired sleep
Four paws stitched the snow in the night
pads clear as ink where the moon leaned close
Something has been coming at dark
light-footed, red as cedar bark
I follow the tracks past the woodpile
my own boots breaking what the paws began
I do not hunt the fox
I hunt what found the hutch and would return
The snow keeps its small accounting
claw, pause, turn toward timber
The Coast Range stands without comment
smoke rising straight from my chimney
At the fence I kneel longer than needed
my hand resting on wire gone cold
I think of how thin winter makes us
me with my small flock, him with his ribs
If I fire it will be for balance
not anger, not sport, but fear of losing
Somewhere in the salal he waits
a body lean with hunger and visible breath
Feb 13
Feb 13, 2026 at 7:22 PM UTC
dog tracks northern snow
joy resounding in motion
deep love connection
Dec 17, 2024
Dec 17, 2024 at 5:03 PM UTC
In emerald seas where shadows play,
Steel ribbons thread the green ballet.
Through whispering pines and mossy glades,
A journey carved by human blades.
The iron serpents hum their tune,
A song that cuts through leafy dune.
Sunlight dances on rails' gleam,
In this hidden, tranquil dream.
Beneath the canopy, worlds collide,
Where nature and man in silence bide.
Tracks through forests' heart, profound,
In this sanctuary, our paths are found.
Aug 18, 2024
Aug 18, 2024 at 1:43 PM UTC
Winter had arrived
overnight, and
we had slept soundly through it, the
snow smothering
any sounds that dared
try to escape.
The morning arrived clear and sunny
and cold.
I was washing the dishes in that
old kitchen sink of ours when I noticed them—
footprints through the snow in our backyard—I couldn’t
say how many sets there were—
starting at the back fence and
proceeding directly
to our kitchen window. You
told me that you were going to head outside
to shovel the walk, but I told you
that I would take care of it, and I put on
my boots but no jacket, and I walked
out the back door, shovel held tightly
in hand. The tracks traced
the full perimeter of our house—
they appeared to be searching
for something—and they stopped
right outside of her
bedroom window—I couldn’t say
how many sets there were, or how long
they’d stood there while she slept.
I don’t know what
compelled me, but I turned the shovel
over, hurriedly using its edge to scrape
away the footprints there beneath the
window, the grass beneath them still
green and struggling to breathe.
And when I came back inside
you asked me
what I was up to out there, and I told you
that it was too cold
to shovel, that we should put on
another *** of coffee,
that we should stay inside
and not face the day,
and let the children
keep sleeping.
Jan 1, 2023
Jan 1, 2023 at 12:53 PM UTC
Harmonies and melodies that accompanied my drift,
nursing wounded soul and often giving it a lift.
Moments when cords and rhythm took me the next mile,
so many old chorus' that could make my heart smile.
Songs and tunes that touched the moments I've seen,
to connect forever to people and places I've been.
Soundtrack to my life to record memories in rhyme,
taking me back as if I were some traveler in time.
At some lonely hour when an old track comes to mind,
stresses and troubles for a time gone and left behind.
Teleported by some in the moment pertinent track,
where a mind can find escape and be taken right back.
The music of who I am, of my soul that shaped my life,
at every joyous moment and every tumultuous next strife.
I play those old tunes and I sing so badly right along,
I can't help but to do so, as its my life and hearts song.
Jul 10, 2022
Jul 10, 2022 at 10:00 PM UTC
Aged, wrinkled and worn
Our Palms of fortune and destiny
Show tracks leading to new places
Playing out the timeline of our lives
Like a show - a Chorus Line
The queues will flock for the matinee
And so this poetical line ends.
Apr 7, 2021
Apr 7, 2021 at 5:10 PM UTC
****** or Heroine?
by Michael R. Burch
(for mothers battling addiction)
serve the Addiction;
worship the Beast;
feed the foul Pythons
your flesh, their fair feast ...
or rise up, resist
the huge many-headed hydra;
for the sake of your Loved Ones
decapitate medusa.
Keywords/Tags: drugs, addiction, user, ****** needle, tracks, marks, pain, despair, recovery
Jun 26, 2020
Jun 26, 2020 at 2:14 AM UTC
On the tracks of our lives,
the autumn of life
may fall on the trail we may travel.
But one may falter on this journey
and the remnant path,
but if we brush aside the failing
that fell before us
we can travel further than we ever realised.
Nov 2, 2019
Nov 2, 2019 at 6:50 PM UTC
Nights Are For Stuff Like This
It's 3am.
The city's sleeping and I'm not.
Lights like scattered dots burn dim outside my window.
People are dreaming and I'm awake thinking of the
life that's been passing through me like second hands-smoke
lingering in the slowed-down traffic of my DNA.
Nights are for stuff like this;
stuff like silken roads through ragged hillsides,
feelings blacker than night that disappear in the
day light, prisms bouncing off grey ash, tiny sparks
falling through trap doors, never again to be seen
nor heard, nor taken for granted upon the long
laid train tracks of this ongoing dance.
Memory like loaded simi-trucks taking me all
the way back through corn fields and hay, through
old hard hitting rain that goes clank, clank in my brain.
Scars cutting through my skin opening again and again
like songs that you hate but can't stop singing on endless
streaming highways-hitching a ride inside my mind,
pitch-perfect pristine and off-key in the dark,
on a night like this blue black over amber gold.
I'm a million miles further away and one mile closer.
Signposts loud and large selling big hopes for
happy dopes, emerging eyes now gone from me
peering through clouds because they can, because
they probably always will.
Because who knows how far they've gone and how
far I've come on this night of all nights awake in the
grid of passing stars and dividing lines, now merging into
my lane for better or for worse where gratitude needs no
promotion, because it just is or is not. Because it can't be faked.
nor pimped. Because it has no need for
patronizing nor apologizing.
Because it's outcome, a side effect of nights like this where
everything makes sense and where nothing makes any sense
at all in this gigantic freeway of time that will eventually reach
a dead end. Where sleep will come 'cause the poetry will have
run itself off the bend.
Ah yea nights are for stuff like this.
Jun 26, 2019
Jun 26, 2019 at 9:29 AM UTC
Where did we go wrong
poem, prose, word
or song?
Apr 19, 2019
Apr 19, 2019 at 11:32 PM UTC
We all come from different walks of life
We all have our own demons to fight
Who am I to tell you what to do
Or what to say
Just be you and you’ll be great
You will find your own way
Life is like a maze
So many different paths to choose
Don’t be afraid of delays
You’ll meet so many people on the way
Embrace the path you decide to take
You can only get lost to find your way
Don’t follow somebody else’s path
This is your maze, you choose the tracks
So take charge and be who you want to be
By
Coco 07
Jan 28, 2019
Jan 28, 2019 at 4:54 PM UTC
I've always wanted to walk down railroad tracks
Balanced on rusty rails
Arms outstretched
Taunting the behemoth
Hit me, hit me
Maybe they lead to my youth
Where mornings were warm
And the air tasted like dew
I would wear a dress just to feel the wind
whip at my skirts
Maybe I could lie down
In the middle, maybe
I could watch it pass
over
me
Or maybe I would lie across
And watch it pass
under
me
Maybe I'm just taunting god
I hear lights and see the wails of sirens
Is it dawn or dusk? I can't
remember
The trees on either side reach out
I wish I could touch them
Hit me, hit me
I'll watch it pass from above
Dec 14, 2018
Dec 14, 2018 at 10:18 PM UTC
There's a place where hands of a clock never move
A place where things are never changing
A place well hidden, not many could ever find it
Only wild animals and a flock of crows
Once upon a time the place was probably on a map
Until early one morning someone awoke
And threw their finger in the air and loudly cried
Eureka! Let's remove the railroad tracks!
Oct 16, 2018
Oct 16, 2018 at 10:27 PM UTC
Friends forever
Doing drugs together
Until I pulled a lever
And tracks were severed
****** barreling
******* caroling
That would make pharaohs sing
Now memories embarrass me
From negativity that shined
I thought fit me fine
But I crossed the line
Of wasting time
End of wits
Tracks were split
Dodging a candlelit
Snake bit
Break pit
Years passed
Pain amassed
Trampled grass
From feet so fast
Things don't last
Now I'm gay
And he's a ****
What can I say?
Maybe it's our posse?
The change I did not see
But pain it has brought me
My sinful past has caught me
Returning shame that had fought me
Show and tell
Sowed in hell
A golden well
Sold then fell
Into two paths
One of laughs
One of wrath
I need a bath
To undo this math
This guilt built
Quilt kilt
Tilts
My mentality
Of congeniality
Back to reality
And functionality
Which devours me
Powerlessly
Struggling to get free
From this depression disease
This bullet train
Bull of pain
Calls my name
From the grain
Of the game
Of my blame
For what remains
Take my lifeblood
And my night flood
Be my right bud
Instead of plight mud
Become invincible
And principled
Not instant mold
Born from cold
There's a track mark
Left from the dark
Of my regretful ark
That seems so stark
It spreads through my body
Making me feel so naughty
Doing mental karate
To say it's not me
It's not my fault
But my complicity
Opened the vault
Filled with salt
Festering inside recovering scars
So even if I'm discovering stars
I'm still locked behind bars
For crimes committed on Mars
Back cracking
Backtracking
Packs stacking
Tacks lacking
Any relent
To my lament
For what I meant
Versus what I sent
But tracks were set
And stations were met
Now I can't pay this debt
When the only way is death
Sep 6, 2018
Sep 6, 2018 at 10:23 PM UTC
Saw her standing on the tracks
Dressed head to toe in black
A smile sat upon her lips
Eyes were sad like sinking ships
Aug 24, 2018
Aug 24, 2018 at 5:33 AM UTC
So many people talk about the
Light at the end of the tunnel.
But they don’t talk about
What comes after that.
They don’t talk about how
The light blinds you when you get too close,
How it completely swallows you, and
How you’re left confused and bewildered afterwards.
No one tells you that change can hurt you,
Internally- the worst way-
Turning your whole world upside down.
No one talks about how the
Light at the end of the tunnel can also be
The light of an oncoming train.
May 8, 2018
May 8, 2018 at 7:20 PM UTC
We run across the tracks,
A horde of desperate children.
Our tears are raked off our cheeks
By the wind that slams into our faces.
Crouching, cowering, gritting our teeth,
A fruitless attempt to make ourselves smaller,
To dodge the never-ending stream
Of lead teeth that eat into our flesh.
Gripping the clammy fingers
Of our only hope,
Until they are pummelled into the floor,
And we leave them behind.
We live to impress,
We walk a tightrope every day.
God help you if you fall,
Because you are on your own.
They’ll only hold your hand
If there is something in it.
They don’t love you,
So just keep running.
Running, running,
Stretch out your fingers,
To the other side.
Because when you fail…
Well at least you can say
one part of you made it…
Right?
Mar 21, 2018
Mar 21, 2018 at 12:25 PM UTC
end of the line my friend
end of the line
well
it was only a matter of time
time
time
time
time
time A train conductor
time sounds the
time horn crossing
time the tracks.
time
time
time
time
time Never to go back.
time
time
time
time
time
time
time
Jan 3, 2018
Jan 3, 2018 at 1:23 PM UTC
The hilltops from home,
Look like an old man's beard.
Bushy all the way.
Tracks are setup for hiking,
Beautiful scene from above.
©sim
Aug 11, 2017
Aug 11, 2017 at 4:55 PM UTC