"palely" poems
Even the sun-clouds this morning cannot manage such skirts.
Nor the woman in the ambulance
Whose red heart blooms through her coat so astoundingly ----
A gift, a love gift
Utterly unasked for
By a sky
Palely and flamily
Igniting its carbon monoxides, by eyes
Dulled to a halt under bowlers.
O my God, what am I
That these late mouths should cry open
In a forest of frost, in a dawn of cornflowers.
28.5k
A dream tree, Polly's tree:
a thicket of sticks,
each speckled twig
ending in a thin-paned
leaf unlike any
other on it
or in a ghost flower
flat as paper and
of a color
vaporish as frost-breath,
more finical than
any silk fan
the Chinese ladies use
to stir robin's egg
air. The silver-
haired seed of the milkweed
comes to roost there, frail
as the halo
rayed round a candle flame,
a will-o'-the-wisp
nimbus, or puff
of cloud-stuff, tipping her
queer candelabrum.
Palely lit by
snuff-ruffed dandelions,
white daisy wheels and
a tiger faced
***** it glows. O it's
no family tree,
Polly's tree, nor
a tree of heaven, though
it marry quartz-flake,
feather and rose.
It sprang from her pillow
whole as a cobweb
ribbed like a hand,
a dream tree. Polly's tree
wears a valentine
arc of tear-pearled
bleeding hearts on its sleeve
and, crowning it, one
blue larkspur star.
3.5k
The Seashore Gathering
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
On the seashores of endless worlds, earth's children converge.
The infinite sky is motionless, the restless waters boisterous.
On the seashores of endless worlds earth's children gather to dance with joyous cries and pirouettes.
They build sand castles and play with hollow shells.
They weave boats out of withered leaves and laughingly float them out over the vast deep.
Earth's children play gaily on the seashores of endless worlds.
They do not know, yet, how to cast nets or swim.
Divers fish for pearls and merchants sail their ships, while earth's children skip, gather pebbles and scatter them again.
They are unaware of hidden treasures, nor do they know how to cast nets, yet.
The sea surges with laughter, smiling palely on the seashore.
Death-dealing waves sing the children meaningless songs, like a mother lullabying her baby's cradle.
The sea plays with the children, smiling palely on the seashore.
On the seashores of endless worlds earth's children meet.
Tempests roam pathless skies, ships lie wrecked in uncharted waters, death wanders abroad, and still the children play.
On the seashores of endless worlds there is a great gathering of earth's children.
Originally published by The Chained Muse. My translation is based on an untitled text in Bangla (Bengali) first published in 1912 and known as "60" due to its numerical placement. Tagore made history by becoming the first Asian to win the Nobel Prize for Literature the following year. Keywords/Tags: seashore, gathering, children, sky, sea, water, dance, sand castles, shells, boats, play, nets, swim, fish, pearls, ships, waves, songs, mother, lullaby, baby, cradle, tempests, death
Mar 30, 2020
Mar 30, 2020 at 11:03 PM UTC
Ah, what can ail thee, wretched wight,
Alone and palely loitering;
The sedge is wither'd from the lake,
And no birds sing.
Ah, what can ail thee, wretched wight,
So haggard and so woe-begone?
The squirrel's granary is full,
And the harvest's done.
I see a lily on thy brow,
With anguish moist and fever dew;
And on thy cheek a fading rose
Fast withereth too.
I met a lady in the meads
Full beautiful, a faery's child;
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.
I set her on my pacing steed,
And nothing else saw all day long;
For sideways would she lean, and sing
A faery's song.
I made a garland for her head,
And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She look'd at me as she did love,
And made sweet moan.
She found me roots of relish sweet,
And honey wild, and manna dew;
And sure in language strange she said,
I love thee true.
She took me to her elfin grot,
And there she gaz'd and sighed deep,
And there I shut her wild sad eyes--
So kiss'd to sleep.
And there we slumber'd on the moss,
And there I dream'd, ah woe betide,
The latest dream I ever dream'd
On the cold hill side.
I saw pale kings, and princes too,
Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;
Who cry'd--"La belle Dame sans merci
Hath thee in thrall!"
I saw their starv'd lips in the gloam
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke, and found me here
On the cold hill side.
And this is why I sojourn here
Alone and palely loitering,
Though the sedge is wither'd from the lake,
And no birds sing.
3.1k
Earthy scented mornings
Thinly trailing mist
Acorns drop from weary trees
Yellow, red and russet frees
Leaves from branches, gently falling
Earth by coloured carpet kissed
Frosty, starlit evening
Palely shining moon
Jun 23, 2012
Jun 23, 2012 at 12:12 PM UTC
her name was Chelsea
she was pretty healthy
until she disliked her belly
she stopped eating at the deli
one day she was found palely
because she starved herself daily
she was insanely faintly
until she passed out gently
everyone became friendly
she fell deathly sick
she was never fixed
as she held on to her crucifix
and whispered song lyrics
she died during the eclipse.
Jun 25, 2013
Jun 25, 2013 at 10:14 AM UTC
Carpals, knees, elbows
scuffed. Cement carpet
freshly sears the fabric
then cuts, but a bruise
silhouettes the tear:
start Saturday raw, soon
swells a red ruby gulp
charring to black coal.
By Monday it slips
into a nebula of purple
constellations, a drink
of red still remaining.
You'll wish it never
faded – a jaundice
dulling swims palely
like the fated colour
of that new bike.
Jan 16, 2014
Jan 16, 2014 at 8:03 PM UTC
My life is like a poem;
And a pure sleep that lasts forever.
Ah, sleep-sleep that is more flamboyant than the stars;
But for which I have not prayed; about which I have not even started.
My life is like a wind;
A wind that grows, within a pair of wings unseen.
My blood groans and roars as it steps forward;
My heart flips and leaps as it falls in love.
Ah, a love that arrived between roads foreign;
A love that slayed me, and tasted my juicy kiss;
Like a tame note, like a flood of roses;
Love that lights my rocks, and burdens my abyss.
And when everything is deaf and purely abysmal;
I shall bloom still, and glistening as rainfalls.
I shall listen to its greedy calls;
I shall begin my poem-as I'm thus hiding, behind the walls!
And the rain shall pour but bleak water;
A water so small, and thereby impure.
But thy eyes are like its earth-that stills and clarifies it;
And thy charms are magnets that charge-and wondrously cure!
As though I have ne'er been mystified;
When I am heartily scared-palely challenged and petrified.
I am but burnt, within this unmuttered torment;
But to my praise I stay loyal, and defined unbent.
Ah, Nikolaas, shalt thou be mine-and be my shield?
Shalt thou rewind my bones that have slept?
As far as I know, this poetry can no-one build;
Loves that other hearts shape; loves that their doubts have kept.
Ah, Nikolaas, shalt thou melt my, my very insane heart?
Of which thy breath hath owned a part;
I shall kiss thee; through thy mint arms-and thy cold sleeves;
I shall be the prettiest goddess God'll ever give.
Oh, Nikolaas, and shall thou purify my rain?
And liberate these tears-and their art of pain;
And let thy heart be the one I judge;
Make me all over sweet-like two twin bars of silky fudge.
And shalt be thou ***** by my shy verse?
For thou hath freed, and forgiven my bare universe;
I am in love, I am riding its wheels;
I am on the moon, no-one knows yet-how grateful I feel.
And Nikolaas, but shalt thou be my moon itself?
Over my darkness, thou shalt stay gripping and smiling;
And to my touches, thou shalt be forever truth;
Unlike this lone stranded poem-which thinks but stays mute;
Thou shalt be mine-on this wan land and in the keen hereafter;
Even when death is dubious-I shall remain and love thee like this; just as I do now-and perhaps forever.
Aug 14, 2013
Aug 14, 2013 at 3:24 PM UTC
slips from nothing hugely poem of
light creating light by leggy moon
over whole earth palely tousled in
maimed and drizzled in silver curving
a point is risen amongst (man) and time
earth away sprawl echoes of finite
sleep.but though it moon over(in
a little naked comely heap of pert
and blazing tinder calmly foisted
between sabled ******* of aching
stupid darkness)burns how and fiercely
eloquent
o moon though small and nothing hugely
poem shall i (man) a poem slip by mortal
wiggling fumbles; and O moon!quiet sleeping
curves away silverly(into pimpled quavering
neatness)i muscle leanly dispute the soil
and up to you gallop sloppy gallons of kiss
(for you are most pleasant.UR round and fit
nearly in my lips (who shall pluck you from
between ******* and fill me burning
)Lust
Oct 2, 2012
Oct 2, 2012 at 3:09 AM UTC
Are my lips not enough like honey?
Are my words not sweet as Eden?
Do I palely compare to the affair of your dreams?
Woe, though I still love me.
Jun 16, 2022
Jun 16, 2022 at 1:14 PM UTC
I will never remove you from my brain's synapses altogether,
Particles, dust-speckles, piceous ashes of you, broken half of
Where the crowning splinter lies.
Heffalump-bray, Big-bird whistle, and feverish laughter
Sink from your tiny lips.
It's worse than preschool television programming.
Maybe you consider yourself a god.
Mouth-rush, crooked sickle-spine, of the cranes' dead oath,
Or like some hindered devil at the reeds on your tongue.
Seven years I have worked with the crutch, and worried
Like arc-lightning, thickly-paned, frail as a frostbow,
Palely lit uvula at the glowing alter.
I am none closer now. To amend the acres where my feet wallow blindly.
The shivering, baroque, tumuli where my splinters clear my steel-hide.
An orchestral bow of crimson blight,
I had dredged supinely through the pithy Latin vowels.
Like the month of a flower, hitched to the acanthine wings of a moth.
The moon clung to your shivers and sickness.
No longer can I keep my hair to frosty old anarchies.
Nights, heaped on the bowels of a smoky weir.
The blank stones that struck my hands of warning.
Beside the clogged, rancorous doom I had reflected
Feb 2, 2017
Feb 2, 2017 at 2:58 PM UTC
You’re exactly like the moon
With all its different phases
The moon that’s tattooed on your forearm
The moon that’s covering your paintings
And just like the moon
You are bold and apparent
With certainly nothing to hide
But although you’re this way
You’re still so far away
To truly understand you up close
So I lie awake sleepless
Because the moon’s made of secrets
As it sits alone in the sky
And now you’re waning and whining
You’re fading, you’re dying
As the sun tries to take over the show
Glowing palely, you shine
As you live for the nightlife
You’re high and you’re faded again
We moondance
We’re kissing
By daytime you’re missing
The light breaks the morning horizon
So by the light of the moon
I’ll see you soon
Living at night because you’re a beautiful sight
But by the time I see light
I’m just another admirer with drowsy eyes
Feb 6, 2014
Feb 6, 2014 at 12:38 AM UTC
Day, and Night
by Michael R. Burch
The moon exposes pockmarked scars of craters;
her visage, veiled by willows, palely looms.
And we who rise each day to grind a living,
dream each scented night of such perfumes
as drew us to the window, to the moonlight,
when all the earth was steeped in cobalt blue―
an eerie vase of achromatic flowers
bled silver by pale starlight, losing hue.
The night begins her waltz to waiting sunrise―
adagio, the music she now hears;
and we who in the sunlight slave for succor,
dreaming, seek communion with the spheres.
And all around the night is in crescendo,
and everywhere the stars’ bright legions form,
and here we hear the sweet incriminations
of lovers we had once to keep us warm.
And also here we find, like bled carnations,
red lips that whitened, kisses drawn to lies,
that touched us once with fierce incantations
and taught us love was prettier than wise.
Keywords/Tags: day, night, love, rhyme, moon, moonlight, pockmarked, craters, window, vase, flowers, fragrance, starlight, music, spheres, communion, crescendo, lovers, kisses, lies, love, unwise
Sep 23, 2020
Sep 23, 2020 at 9:22 PM UTC
4/23/2016
"Speaking of batteries,
what's the positive in this? Negative?"
she threw out there, lithe little
extensions of her hand palely wrapped about a martini glass stem. It held seltzer and ginger.
Long Island City, Queens
twinkled cobaltly, covertly, in the
harbour
incognito, morphing into the sky
in the gloaming.
"All those people," I said, ignoring
the question. I always ignore the question. "So many. But this city
so cruel and brutalist and impersonal."
She shook her head,
stirred her cocktail stirrer
the mint sprig moved to the bottom
of the glass.
"As opposed
to what?"
Apr 26, 2016
Apr 26, 2016 at 8:32 PM UTC
a little girl once wanted and thought she could keep the entire world. every night she cried at the sight of the stars, her heart burst whenever the flowers would bloom, she'd dance in the rain whenever it would so much as drizzle.
one night, when her little heart began to overflow with so much yearning, she walked to a cliff by the sea with a jar in hand. she opened the jar, holding it up to the sky and watched the delicate universe make its way inside it all so gently. immediately, she capped the jar and was amazed that she held the world in her hands. for many days she took it around with her, leaping through rivers on stepping stones and walking through sea shores in the light of day.
one day, suddenly, the bottle fell from her hands and her heart stopped. she could not believed she had dropped it. she picked up the jar, and suddenly it seemed as if the universe was wounded. she could not believe she did such a thing.
on the night of that unfortunate day, she made her way to a mountaintop with a heavy heart and her vision murky from tears. just as she was high enough to touch the clouds, she carefully chose a spot and stood firmly, still sniffling a little bit.
"i did not take care of you when you trusted me. i do not deserve you, universe." she said, her voice shakey as she uncapped the jar. "i am sorry."
in the same manner she caught the universe, she held her open jar towards the heavens and watched the universe pour out the bottle in wisps—the stars and planets and all of space and time dispersed before her eyes and again, she began to cry. she wondered how she was even able to keep such a beautiful thing and how she had failed it.
days passed and the girl was lonely again. as she strolled past plants and vines, they would wilt in sadness. the sun would shine so palely in the morning that even the moon could not console it. she was so sad that even nature joined her in silence.
on one morning, she woke up feeling a different beating in her heart. she stood up from her flower bed to look at her reflection, and to her surprise she found something shining just right under her left shoulder.
there, she found the universe had come back to her—not in the same jar it used to be in, but in her heart.
"do not ever think you do not deserve the world just because of your shortcomings," she heard the universe whisper, her hand in her chest. "i have found my way to your heart and here i will stay."
and that is how the girl began to carry the universe she had so loved in her heart, forever.
Oct 25, 2016
Oct 25, 2016 at 8:07 AM UTC
Everyone is a wanderer
so few find their hearts' desire
the winds their fury unleash
the sun burns like wild fire.
There's no resting place
only slippery rocks, sharp ascents and mire
but there's no turning back
though the prospect is dire.
There's no food or water
for the hungry and thirsty wanderer
the night sky palely looks from asunder
the stars are weary and lose their glitter.
Everyone is a wanderer
destiny is the driver
but none wants to be a loser
this defines him in his perilous splendour.
Jan 21, 2016
Jan 21, 2016 at 6:40 PM UTC
everyday i'm discussing with everyday, myself as i make out to the glamouring
the inches and dashes of every self i have
and stitches of sinew here in which lies the me that is this i, i that am
i walked in leaves of grass, of wriggling splendor's summers of shoulders
and achy crimsoned necks by the suns meters of light
measuring the stints of our crawling opaque days and suns of many sons
it's very that is that even when sun should repose his ***** of uncadenced
carefully miraculous shimmering blood
like orange and ardent flesh he'd go on us it, giving his very stuff our bodies
to wear on our wheres and whens and whys. is night not also beautiful?
it is naked beautiful. **** and beautiful
plenteous and beautiful with all its hearts in tinder palely igniting every
atom of copious earth. bowls of copious illuminant children, the things
which will become after us
the us that we were before their coming. but they are gorgeous and neither
would i weep if in my going they should take that space where were was
i. resting the shouts of my self
in the orchards of youth, i am now so but it's quickly running, flitting
eagerly from my this. in vines and plurals i am single and many. neither
none nor many. but many ones,
little bubbles of tranquil vile fluid guttering the songs of wind.
i go to streams and they are me. i go to mountains and they are me. i go
to valleys and they are me.
can i be streams and mountains and valleys? can i not be streams and
mountains and valleys? they are weeds and i am a **** a **** is a rose.
i am rose.
i am blossomed in full spring. able of petals. i am turned to the sun, with my
root between the lips of earth. who is my lover. the earth is woman.
she is a ****
a **** is a rose.
by another name. they smell just as sweet.
Apr 27, 2011
Apr 27, 2011 at 11:21 PM UTC
thee art the night
indescribably hued a rose
and maketh me to lay
in the ocean of your petals in the velvet fissure of your *******
supine; yoked to the chariot of
your thighs who,in their twain, is silken breaths of heaven
thou art a flower. in whose tremulous stems i am stupidly thrusting
a thorn. palely now a part of your flesh. in the part of your flesh.
swims my lips on the svelte belly of your sternum. under and greedy
of your eyes. the lashes of pleasure. inking your face.
but though i deserve you not: incredibly you made me for your bed
blooming simple honey.a summers day's night
Jul 31, 2010
Jul 31, 2010 at 12:18 PM UTC
You Never Listened
by Michael R. Burch
You never listened,
though each night the rain
wove its patterns again
and trembled and glistened ...
You were not watching,
though each night the stars
shone, brightening the tears
in her eyes palely fetching ...
You paid love no notice,
though she lay in my arms
as the stars rose in swarms
like a legion of poets,
as the lightning recited
its opus before us,
and the hills boomed the chorus,
all strangely delighted ...
Originally published by Contemporary Rhyme. Keywords/Tags: ears, hearing, listening, eyes, blindness, unseeing, unawareness, insensitivity, rain, stars, lightning, thunder
Mar 29, 2020
Mar 29, 2020 at 1:02 AM UTC
The sky of yellow
palely pastel'd
the hills blue grey
their shapes so stark
against the coloured heavens
the tree
with delicate hanging fronds
breaks through the two
a black against the forests monotone
as if one note was blown
that never ends
dreams take form in the subconscious mind
those elements predict the atmosphere
set the stage
what shall I dream tonight
armed with this sight
I'll probably never know
they dissipate in morning light
Margaret Ann Waddicor 3rd May 2016
May 4, 2016
May 4, 2016 at 10:30 AM UTC
For All That I Remembered
by Michael R. Burch
For all that I remembered, I forgot
her name, her face, the reason that we loved ...
and yet I hold her close within my thought:
I feel the burnished weight of auburn hair
that fell across her face, the apricot
clean scent of her shampoo, the way she glowed
so palely in the moonlight, angel-wan.
The memory of her gathers like a flood
and bears me to that night, that only night,
when she and I were one, and if I could ...
I’d reach to her this time and, smiling, brush
the hair out of her eyes, and hold intact
each feature, each impression. Love is such
a threadbare sort of magic, it is gone
before we recognize it. I would crush
my lips to hers to hold their memory,
if not more tightly, less elusively.
Published by The Raintown Review, The Eclectic Muse, Kritya, Gostinaya (in a Russian translation by Yelena Dubrovin), Boston Poetry Magazine, Freshet, Jewish Letter (Russia), Poetry Life & Times, Sonnetto Poesia, Trinacria, The New Formalist, Pennsylvania Review. Keywords/Tags: Memory, remembrance, love, name, features, face, hair, eyes, lips, mrbmem, crush, impression, recognize, recognition, remember, remembered, forgot, forgotten, angel, wan, night, flood
Jun 5, 2020
Jun 5, 2020 at 10:00 PM UTC
I have not looked out the window for weeks
weeds will break me to pieces,
they seem too much like weddings I’ve escaped
where the groom and bride are useless
to everyone but each other, then pulled away.
I think they look beautiful. I do.
The way females palely grow tousled with
tree limbs, cautious not to snap one with weight
and go tumbling from hilltops
dead blades of grass penetrate their kneecaps.
Neither are quite green or brunette
but in discernible loveliness when falling from
a girl’s skin, a satellite rained in cherry beads.
I must say I am in love with the gore of it
needing a heart to pump, but I cannot watch
as their minds dive within.
Mar 11, 2013
Mar 11, 2013 at 6:28 PM UTC
The courtyard was overgrown
With dead grass and wilted flowers
Surrounded on all sides by decrepit walls
Of fragile and ancient masonry
Directly in the center
Was a lone statue of Mary
The mourning mother of Jesus
Solemn and downcast
In her cracked and chipped arms
Lay her fallen son
And you could see the greif
Imprinted on her stone face
The night was drawing near
And strangely so
For the shadows seemed to move
At an almost visible pace
Before I knew it
The moon had risen
Shinning palely through towers
And cracks in the walls
The foliage thay appeared so dead before
Sprung into a strange livliness
Giving off a faint luminescence
Of midnight purples and blues
Looking about in apprehensive wonder
I noticed my surroundings change
Taking on a dark elegance
Which tempted and tantilized my mind
I looked again to the statue
Horrified, I watched
What looked to be blood
Pour from the dead Christ's stone wounds
Seeping into the ground
And spread through
The strange plants
Around the courtyard
And I saw his mother
With a crooked smile over him
Oct 26, 2016
Oct 26, 2016 at 1:45 AM UTC
For All That I Remembered
by Michael R. Burch
For all that I remembered, I forgot
her name, her face, the reason that we loved ...
and yet I hold her close within my thought:
I feel the burnished weight of auburn hair
that fell across her face, the apricot
clean scent of her shampoo, the way she glowed
so palely in the moonlight, angel-wan.
The memory of her gathers like a flood
and bears me to that night, that only night,
when she and I were one, and if I could ...
I’d reach to her this time and, smiling, brush
the hair out of her eyes, and hold intact
each feature, each impression. Love is such
a threadbare sort of magic, it is gone
before we recognize it. I would crush
my lips to hers to hold their memory,
if not more tightly, less elusively.
Published by The Raintown Review, The Eclectic Muse, Kritya, Gostinaya (in a Russian translation by Yelena Dubrovin), Boston Poetry Magazine, Freshet, Jewish Letter (Russia), Poetry Life & Times, Sonnetto Poesia, Trinacria, The New Formalist, Pennsylvania Review
Keywords/Tags: Memory, remembrance, love, name, features, face, hair, eyes, lips, crush, impression, recognize, recognition, remember, remembered, forgot, forgotten, angel, wan, night, flood
Mar 5, 2020
Mar 5, 2020 at 8:52 PM UTC