Silence is listening
                   For the music;
Knowing when to be still
                   To hear one's self.

When the body stands silent,
                    Everything moves;
Silences are the noises,
                   The echo of everything.

Without being heard
               The silence becomes visible,
The footsteps of the light
               Can be heard in the meditation.

The silence walks with you
              As the world makes you silent,
The idea is to hear the music
              That is in the quietude of your peace.

T-The gift of life is oft stolen away
H-Horrid weaponry does the affray
E-Endlessly casualties will parlay

G-Gleaming soldiers eyes gone for rest
I-In unforgiving battles so harsh of test
F-Fighting at a land's utmost behest
T-Terrible the deadly toll is to attest

O-Over and over munitions have terminated
F-Flagrantly thieving any quietude generated

L-Loved sons of kinfolk seen to weep
I-Infinite this sadness ever so deep
F-From a beautiful benefit the cost steep
E-Extinguished by war's insane keep

she
Eats mine emotions
And mars my veriest heed
Her arms is a fortress,a congenial devotion
The cannibal of whom I find peace
But certainly,the no creed
I inhere to●
■
Her
Breath speaks severity
But of fortune prudence and quietude
She sinks me the depths of her whims
Yet,ludicrously of null whips
■
Her
Eyes eclipse blunt my sights
And rancour the rhymes of my visions
But then,she is the fair breed of gleams
A pleasant hue of sparkles I beseige
■
Her
Tender tongue carriers coals
Of undying vengeance
Of which every touch trembles
Yet even as so
It feels finer than rosy Arabian night breezes
■
But
Her crest which be the counsel
Of which the wildest devilry passions is seeked
Chides and macerate my mastered pettings
■
Yet
She sets tables in her thighs
And serve the most but motley affections
■
She is despotic but decent

SADIST
©Historian E.Lexano
®Recalcitration With Excellent

Yes, perhaps 'tis true.
Everywhere I go-with all t'ese dwindling thoughts on my mind-
'tis always the same shadows that roam, and moan-
before my eyes: and t'eir never-ending business.
Crawling on t'eir lips,
poisoning t'eir bosoms, chins, and hips-
but unrelenting in their unfolded shades;
with a swamp of bruises like mazes-tangled mazes;
likening them to spoiled, yet uncherished, little pearls.
How despairing-such views I obtaineth, on my every journey!
But shalt there still be space for us, to be outstanding;
to understand this world from a pair of eyes
glistening like unquestioning gentleness; but learning simultaneously
its unvivid perspectives
with such comprehension t'at is crystal clear;
such wit t'at is far from recklessness and greed-
salutations that are pure, and distant from any blighting threats
of equivocation? For t'is world is, in spite of its minuteness,
was framed and brought into life from
awesome darkness, abysmal cells of lifelessness
and hateful ambiguity.
How terrifying!
And often have I enforced myself to wandereth into those shades,
with unmolested poems boiling up in my brains-
and t'ose windy thoughts toppling out into th' paper
on my hand,
jostling through my veins like some ghastly, furious power
t'at's unseen, invisible as it is to th' human eye-
frail and susceptible to th' weather's surly temptations-
and entrapping me in the shrieks of its wondrous grot-
so I could never wane it any further, in my guileless brambles.
How I have dreaded t'ose sights-and t'eir dormant treachery! Lessons of
guilt, teaching of such guilty flakes of harm
and abomination! And how in my following quietude have I pondered-
t'at t'is would be just a balmy prelude to some far bigger strains of
mockery, obstinacy, and destitution. Hark to how those powers
shall arise! And that will indeed be th' abjuration of our splendidness-
everything shalt stop at a halt-everything will become flawed,
and no more poems shalt be liberated-from living souls, and t'eir undamaged
blood, as t'ey still are now! How I shiver at t'ose possibilities, as soon as our
latent enemies be on th' loose-free in t'eir ruthlessness, traces of dark,
unperturbed miseries, and brutal savagery.
And shalt we shine no more-like those summer flowers that are waiting for us-
to be fed daily like th' hungry morning doves;
with their thorns as sharp as love, and innocent gladness
in the arms of their lips-'tis but a scent so dear to the heartbeat
of oureth salubrious mornings.
But t'at danger, danger indeed! And its eyes of glaring monstrosity!
And 'tis just of substantial profoundness t'at we should be
cautious-yes, cautious, my dear fellows, towards t'ose signs
of th' upcoming storm-th malevolent storm of human rage, t'at shalt attack us
one day-at one perilous night, unpredicted and unexpected is its fate-
especially when all th' battling footsteps areth
peaceful in their slumbers-and no more palms dancing around
piles of paper-in th' holy procurement of continual wealth.
How t'at moment shalt be our early Armageddon-awakened shalt be
all rivers of terrors, and waves of hatred. How t'is beautiful solitude shalt end-
in th' fierce burning, brimming death of t'at flame-credulous shalt we be,
disempowered from th' heat-which shalt bring us but our dead feet.
Thus I but sincerely hope t'at gloom shalt not conquer our race-
the noblest of all creatures on earth-on t'is dull earth, fatigued as it is
from all th' uniformed battles, hatred, and anger-t'at untiringly sneer
at th' faces of those dying soldiers.
Peace, peace, my dear mates!
Ought to realize thou now-t'at swords shalt shed blood only if instructed.
So tranquility is but in oureth hands-yes, we are but th' key to our own salvation,
and since it is so, shalt we move forward and be the charms of t'is world's
new foundation: for it is our own life that we shalt save.
Peace, my friends, shalt but break all t'ese unseen boundaries amongst us,
and enrich our fathom of t'eir unspoken presence; so t'at th' small world is but
th' most dwelling of comfort, and aught but ease to our hearts-
our very dear, dear hearts in t'is life.

Blue Spruce

Do you walk in a desert the howling wind finds no rest within your tortured breast. The desert scrub can host many realities sadness scraped raw the only comfort rub the wound with desert sand pray its

warmth will reach deeper give the hint of comfort long lost on a soul finding it hard to remember kindness and its affects. You wanted only what everyone wants comfort and fulfillment but you have

found these have elusive qualities almost ghost like never lasting longer than fleeting moments. Will the
road wind filled with expectation only to end in senseless nothingness. How many times can you smile

through the tears get up and start again why not change your identity maybe the gods that have it in for
you will be fooled give you the blessings that are common to so many. This is not what your day dreams

envisioned who ever questioned or dared to think up these black mortifications. You look for a hand to guide but only find those that prize themselves and forget you leaving you even more lost than before.

The edges of despair crowd in your mind swirls is their not a promised land for people like me. Maybe a
move would be in order a new beginning surely a fresh start will win the day where did I hear that

somewhere in the land of the truly delusional you find when yet again you find life shows its power to roll and out of nowhere unseen upheaval throws you for a hard spill. Now you find a veritable waste land but

yours is city streets trash strewn among those that walk with empty stares. The hearts silently bleed the
well where tears once were formed filled with debris still the echo can be heard from childhood laughter

was it that terribly long ago. As it happens on those blessed occasions was it real or a dream you have
enjoyed the pleasure of Christmas and the green fir trees that fill the local lots the scent that drifts from

room to room the little wild thing setting there all aglow gives the sweetest thrill. What is a blue spruce in
my mind I followed this rutted road through the forest green and the mist had settled insulating every

living thing with vibrancy this the most wondrous scene the forest truly gleams. Stand among the towering giants what a hush you are bombarded by the silence you are in the greatest ease a freefall into

this quietude quiet breathing is all that is heard as wonder destroys every vesture of disquiet and alarm.
loses its rich blue color. The point was we need to be grafted into the true vine. The most important guide

post to finding this glorious life while on earth is follow the sacred text that says if you truly desire truth on the inward parts you will find it. Many doors are marked holy and blessed but after entering you find

only the tormented false ideas of self important men. He is the door and those that enter there will set among angels and the life of the blue spruce will be yours not inferior given to fading to lonely darkened

gray but vibrant hues of azure blue your home in that blessed promise laughter and joy your possession forever more.

after Alexandra Leaving, a song by Leonard Cohen

<>

to go where?

to a city self-consuming in madness,
giving every excuse to stay, and yet,
it came to me just now when the poet
must be leaving his redoubt, with doubt,
and return to the concrete and anomie
of a different kind of splendid isolation

when the last leaf meanders slow down
to the battlefield, and the falling terminado,
and the tree branches are stick figures, each
finger pointing skyward in an j’accusing manner,
accussing & conceding defeat, begging for mercy,
their pleadings too much for me to bare and bury

when green has been wiped clean, and deleted
from the dictionary of colors, my moth eaten soul,
can no longer be granted a stay of execution by
merely looking at the landscape and seascape
to admire their friendly contrasting schemes,
their installation in me of the awe of a visual
quietude, that was an astonishing injection
not truly appreciated till now, too late and
still early, the awe colorations of nature’s vibrancy

The gods have come, my soul hoisted upon their
broad shoulders, the dead-appearing tree branches
can no longer keep their poet safe, hold him back from
meeting his fate; now, he too is a leaving but
floating upward, unlike like the fallen crowds that have
come to rest upon the soil that born them, now to be buried,
all saying: Goodbye Island Poet leaving,

Island Poet
has no poem, no good understanding, no vision,
had no plan, no foresight, only a hope against hope,
that safety was/is not seasonal, Van Morrison reminds,
“These are the days of endless summer,”are memories,
to be held onto tightly, until when if I pass muster, angels
will return to my island abode, where my natural friends
will greet me again, with a flowering and new births,
and The Island Poet can once again revel in ideas in words like
future, sanity, when boarding the ferry with a one way ticket smile.

Trundling through the Room of Word,
The crude remarks and the young absurd,
They come an go, no valedictory speech,
Just to and fro, a vestige for each.

So I sit and I stare, with a nihilist prayer,
And I ***** my heart to the sticking place,
Left alone in the quietude, left alone in a private mood,
No crude remarks for a tired face.

So I sit and I stare, yes, I sit and I stare, 
screen boring me holes for eyes,
I wait and I dare, my words in the air, 
The atmosphere sets and dries - 
The atmosphere sets and it dies.

I'll wait there, 'do something, accompany me'
I'll wait there, like waiting for a train.

But once I've waited, no latened, loving response belated,
I tire of this melancholy station,
I'm alone in the Room 'o' Words, my company split to fifths and thirds,
It's time for another, emotional vacation.

Do you walk in a desert the howling wind finds no rest within your tortured breast. The desert scrub can host many realities sadness scraped raw the only comfort rub the wound with desert sand pray its warmth will reach deeper give the hint of comfort long lost on a soul finding it hard to remember kindness and its affects. You wanted only what everyone wants comfort and fulfillment but you have found these have elusive qualities almost ghost like never lasting longer than fleeting moments. Will the road wind filled with expectation only to end in senseless nothingness. How many times can you smile through the tears get up and start again why not change your identity maybe the gods that have it in for you will be fooled give you the blessings that are common to so many. This is not what your day dreams envisioned who ever questioned or dared to think up these black mortifications. You look for a hand to guide but only find those that prize themselves and forget you leaving you even more lost than before. The edges of despair crowd in your mind swirls is their not a promised land for people like me. Maybe a move would be in order a new beginning surely a fresh start will win the day where did I hear that somewhere in the land of the truly delusional you find when yet again you find life shows its power to roll and out of nowhere unseen upheaval throws you for a hard spill. Now you find a veritable waste land but yours is city streets trash strewn among those that walk with empty stares. The hearts silently bleed the well where tears once were formed filled with debris still the echo can be heard from childhood laughter was it that terribly long ago. As it happens on those blessed occasions was it real or a dream you have enjoyed the pleasure of Christmas and the green fir trees that fill the local lots the scent that drifts from room to room the little wild thing setting there all aglow gives the sweetest thrill. What is a blue spruce in my mind I followed this rutted road through the forest green and the mist had settled insulating every living thing with vibrancy this the most wondrous scene the forest truly gleams. Stand among the towering giants what a hush you are bombarded by the silence you are in the greatest ease a freefall into this quietude quiet breathing is all that is heard as wonder destroys every vesture of disquiet and alarm. Your vision intensifies as this endless pleasure mounts your soul grows its edges that were raggedly torn now renewed fully healed. What a fortress this stand of trees a thousand enemies could never surmount this pure airy wood not a king here stands but a poor beggarly soul has found the greatest ****** land bequeathed by nature’s bountiful generosity in any direction even the lofty height held with sterling sites this never could be bought even gold bows its self down to this sacred grove diamonds and emeralds fair no better their worth seems undignified here. The question arises does this place exist a great English writer wrote of the cathedral in the pine yes both places exist the sadness described in the beginning and this wondrous place a wonderful preacher related this story of a blue spruce he encountered in years long gone by it was different than just the run of the mill blue spruce you usually found he inquired of the nursery owner about the shape and color. He was told this one has been grafted by this means it never loses its rich blue color. The point was we need to be grafted into the true vine. The most important guide post to finding this glorious life while on earth is follow the sacred text that says if you truly desire truth on the inward parts you will find it. Many doors are marked holy and blessed but after entering you find only the tormented false ideas of self important men. He is the door and those that enter there will set among angels and the life of the blue spruce will be yours not inferior given to fading to lonely darkened gray but vibrant hues of azure blue your home in that blessed promise laughter and joy your possession forever more.

"Nothing is so healing as the human touch."


Started:    June 21, 2011
Finished:  August 14, 2011

"Nothing is so healing as the human touch."

Purportedly, the final words of Bobby Fischer, the reclusive, oft bizarre-acting Chess Grandmaster, whose life deserves your examination.  

I wasted decades of my life in a loveless, sexless, miserable marriage. I read his dying words, and the poem~notion was born, but the words had their own timetable and it made me crazy.

All the facts you need to read this old poem are now in your possession.
~-----------------------------------------------~
Mos­­t poems used to just tumble out,
Sudoku words combos,
Gunslinger I was,
poetically licensed to shoot
from the hip (the lip?).

Then you go mute, until that second,
When once again,
Machine gun stanzas fall like
Cheerios
Spilling all over the kitchen floor,
As they always do at Two Am
When quietude is in high season,
And the whole house is sleeping.

Once in awhile,
The title~idea recorded,
But the poem unwrit,
just won't come.
*** but no ******.

The words smack you,
Write me, I deserve it,
A challenged duel glove
Goes kissy kissy on your face,
But the words,
The choice of weapons
Eludes for weeks, months.  

So Bobby,
Your challenge
Long ago accepted,
But my reply imperfect,
Has lain bound and gagged,
A poem-in-progress
Hid in the trunk of my heart,
Unable to escape, even when
Escape attempted, unsuccessful.

From June till August moon,
Your dying words have been
A cancer growing, within,  
Hiding from my bullets
Invented to radiate,
Your final words, explicate,
Explode and expose.

Your life,
An essay on life in solitary,
Anti-social would immodestly describe your life best.

How came you then to exclaim,
Re the glories of human touch?

Ah a dying man's last regret,
A simple cri du couer,
Nothing extraordinaire,
A basic 101 shoulda/woulda
Of "I coulda done it better,"
What's the big deal?

Until this exact second,
Sunday rain jolted body from bed
Do I instant understand my obsession,
The import to me,
The need to capture
The haunt of the healing
Of your dying words.  

Life is small, miniaturized
When numbered in decades -
Five, six, seven,
Maybe,
Eight nine or even ten.  

How came I to pass so many,
Discarded whole decades,
Of the few we garner
Without the sustenance of
Human Touch?

How came I to allow this disaster to pass?

How did I advance to the next grade/decade,
When a failing grade was scarlet tattooed
In ****** scars upon my chest?

Would be easy to dismiss as just another whiney rant
That is no longer relevant to you,
Lies I told myself, no longer resonate, over, now.

Never.  

Everything matters.  

Summation.  Accumulation.

Day Counter Totals  reveal gaps of years
That cannot be refilled so your accounting
Must include a retelling of the
Wasted days and acknowledge with your dying breath,

Nothing is so healing as the human touch.
~~~~~~~
Happy 3rd Birthday poem.

Even a World So Ugly As This        
  
  
                  Is Full of Beautiful Things.  
  
  
  
  
It was one of those evenings  
when men feel that truth, goodness and beauty  
are one.  
                            
  
  
  
  
  
Waste no day with too-much sleep,  
              Darling,  
The wilderness beckons.  
  
  
Let us rustle the trees.  
Remember to laugh, Remember to sing.  
  
Fill again my head with constellations.  
Fill again my head with consolations of sound.  
For i am inseparable from you, and you from me as well.  
  
  
Remember to dance, Remember to dream.  
Remember to listen, Remember to see.  
For even a world as ugly as this  
      Is full of beautiful things.  
  
  
All other questions of the mortal coil  
More or less become clear  
In the unwinding.  
  
Hushed and heedless,  
The sunflower, chico, and the fountain  
Twi-lit with honey.  
Forests grand with oaks, and the lunar zig-zag which paints the mountain.  
  
  
The slow dripping noise beside you,  
The cool *** of night become icicle morning.  
  
A thousand thousand impish clamors call out!  
The elfin quietude.  The flighty bird. The brotherhood.    
  
The mirror changes with moods.  
  
The brother, the sister.  The merry-go-round of laughing children.  
The daughter with a bouquet of curls beaming gold, red, brown sincerity.  
The freckled enchantment of lovers perennially in Idumaean night.  
  
  
The artistry of female radiance on which all things are born and balanced.  
Beauty such as to drive a mind to madness.  O  
And the splendid metaphysics of the male,      
The shimmering brandy of honed muscle and action.  
  
I am recalling, the ebony of her form,  
Perfect in inexhaustible allurement!  
  
I am recalling, the pale fragility of another,    
Perfect in exquisite pulchritude!  
  
The friendly mutt whose voice exalts sonnets of pure love.    
The great haunches of colts at full run.  
Tendrils of primordial music bloom on the wind!  
  
  
Under the water the world drowns and continues on.  
Yet the measure of mocking men produces only sand  
Fit to fill a broken hourglass.  
  
Let not gladness be empty banter amongst us  
Ye city of perplexed imaginings!  
City of labyrinths, curves, catwalks, and spires.  
An elegant evening strolling with you produces charming memories.  
  
In abandoned churches the ***** blessed us heathens with greater timbre and romances  
Than a thousand caterwauling religions.  
  
  
With Juliet's rose between my teeth  
My jaunty daydream burst out laughing !  
In the snug lamplight of home again  
Vines and evergreen ropes of oleander twined up to the roof and quite through!  
& Together we climbed it to find the proof.  
  
  
Refine your strength, refine your shame.  
By all means, breath deep, lustily!  
  
Even the body which drags weary feet.  
Even the nervewrack'd hours dark and steep .  
Midnight strikes quickly and time melts away, completely.  
  
Apprehend again the heart  
Before it washes away in the storm.  
This and all things that we cannot untie  
Should not bind us to an early grave.  
  
  
Here i grow too old for fearing frivolous shadows.  
The eyes fill with sleep - and then reopen.  
The eyes fill with sleep - and then they do not.  
The conversation carries on .  
  
At times perhaps we hear the ocean  
      grinding grinding  
Those orphaned spirits of old Edens,  
What soon again we are to become.  
  
  
But what is a home unwanted?  
                       it is nothing!  
  
And what is a life unlived in?  
                  it is nothing!  
  
  
The surgeon with steady and learned hands.  
The mechanic with hard and learned hands.  
The soldier. The mother.  The strength of one in solitude.  
The strength of those whom lean upon each-other.  
  
Bubbling bedfellows of rivers rambling  
in a forest of Birch and wildflower.  
The Odyssey in the park with you, under a pagan serenade of moons.  
The red blood of pomegranates passed between.  
  
The throb and churn of engines is lovely in its way.  
The darkness is lovely in its way.  
The present, the past, the future - all the sunsets,  
Sonorous in their way.  
  
Weep and weep into the dusk.  
But what do you imagine bitterness shall win you?  
  
    
The natural harmony and dis-harmony.  
Towers of strained hardening.  
The mud and the water.  The fire which governs.  
Grapes upon the vine, and diamonds in the mine.  
I provoke myself onward.  
  
And say let us speak hastily, neighbor,  
For what time is there to waste  
On expectant verses, and platitudes to over-made faces?  
  
I for one do not care much for dawdling beneath false skies.  
The realist parts of me know too well of life's harsh cruelties, and yet,  
                  realize also that reality is the theater of artifice.  
                  - and you are ever free to see it as you wish.  
  
  
The mirror changes with moods.  
  
  
I for one prefer the perfume of the moment.  
Nothing simplified, and perhaps, yes everything!  
The human smells and earthy musks.  The animal abruptness.  
The persisting imagination, the infinite onward.  
  
I for one prefer to hear the music outpouring  
loud and rockus,  
            Rather than the bells that morn us.
And so...
...From the Benevolent Ashes, We Rise!

It was not in the road
that took me there
but the way my heart
always remained the same
rushing through college corridors,
open dissection tables,
woodwork poetry breathren.

Indestructible construction
of these cerebral plates
left me the mind of a surgeon
and the heart of a poet.

In the cold operating room
they cut open his chest-
blood gushing out and I could
see why sometimes a little hurt
could cause a lot of noise.
Ventricle, atrium.
A nick that ricocheted,
a word that spelled
goodbye.

There was a rhythm in his heart
and for once I could feel
synchronicity was never so beautiful;
almost teary-eyed
I could find those verses
lost between the veins,
quietude pumping out slowly.

Lost in the mistranslation
of his chest
till the nurse said

"Doctor, your patient's dying"

This pearl. Ah, this beautiful, precious pearl.
Creamy, buttery; rich and velvety.
A teardrop. Wrought beneath the churning swirl
Of a deep and unfathomable sea.
A tear shed for unobserved injury
Penetrating calcareous armour;
Weeping silently; seeking serenity
And embracing quietude with ardour.
The injured life gives way to a treasure
Near unimaginable.  Beguiling.
A jewel in life beyond true measure.
Natural and pure. A gift of being.  
      The world is our oyster. Imperfect. Whole.
      The pearl - a lithe and unencumbered soul.

As the earth twirls
around the sun
like a dervish whirling
for her beloved,
so am I moved
into an artless dance
timelessly birthed
from the primordial flow
of the eternal river
fleetingly living
as the will of my soul.

Surrendering
in earnest
to the cosmic song,
I now rise to sing
in the key of life.

I walk the deserts
and valleys of dark,
with silent resilience,
and true faith of heart,
through unwritten paths
as yet shrouded in fear.
Let the burdens of truth
be all mine to bear!

Courage inspired
by internal fires,
I thrive with love
like a dancing flame
ever-blazing truth
that ignites by heart
and consumes my mind
in the peace I find.

Quietude in my heart
by the wisdom of night,
will i rise as a sun
that brings truth to light.

Quietude in my heart,
is truth without voice,
as the music of spirit
brings soul to rejoice.

Quietude in my heart
sacred peace as my nest
on my quest to come true
on the path of the blessed.

The insidious wrath of age has pilfered her beauty ..
Rusted chains hang in quietude , wrenched in dubious functionality ....
Superfluous stockyards , fencing long in need of repairs ..
Barns that once bustled with the drudgery of agriculture can only whisper ..
Wind chimes trill in the cold afternoon , the crack of the hammer to the anvil gone ..
Tractor implements lie frozen , a lone Crow stands guard over barren orchards* ..

Here is an exercise
to help you learn a little bit
more about where we are
and what acts on us:

Pour yourself a bath,
as luxurious as can be.
Put in the salts, the oils,
the fragrances, the bubbles…

Make sure you pour
it hot, as hot as you can
handle when you dip in that
first cautious toe…

Slide in up to your chin and
soak in quietude while
your muscles untie their knots
and you lose yourself to that dreary
form of half-awake relaxation.

After a time, your tranquil state
will become a quiet form
of discomfort. The body
will begin to simulate a rising fever
as your temperature moves upward
towards equilibrium with the water,
the stomach will start to feel
unsettled and you
will have had enough.

Now, here comes the test:

Remove the drain plug and
remain motionless, unresponsive,
as the water slurps down
around you.

Your body will fall
as the water drains,
folding and bending
gravity packing you down
molding you into cast of the
tub you are laying in.
When the water is fully
drained and your rubbery,
warm muscles are stripped
of their recent buoyant freedoms,
you will feel with full awareness
the immensity of that Universal force
that acts on us without rest.

It’s amazing that we aren’t
all in exceptional shape.

I sat there like a museum of moments,
a mosaic of emotions
as she dissected my personas
and did an autopsy of my past.

Memories climbed my spine
from the forgotten attics in my heart
with every question, she asked.

But my tongue was a drought
and my voice box was a rust box,
as the child in me
was bullied into quietude.

My edgy, messy and raw memories
molded my perception,
rewrote my interpretation
and deepened my experience.

There was underlying vengeance
as the layers of fabricated scabs were scrapped
to disclose the deeply entrenched, tender emotional scars.

As the present, struck a cord
my limbs would turn into cement
as the echo would bring me back
to the endless street of time
and I would be dragged
through open wounds within me.

The pain would seep in the nooks
and crannies of my soul.
At every jibe and remark
one more part of my flesh
would be chiseled away.

The sky would join in my sorrow
as the clouds gathered like sheep
summoned by a shepherd
and then we would begin to weep
our unresolved issues
onto tissues.

I revisited the bathrooms
that became sanctuary in high school
with its gossip soaked walls
and tear-stained countertops.

I dream of the people
that have lost their way in my memory;
a fabrication of nostalgia.
But the tranquility of waves,
can’t even erase the memories of their wrongdoings.

My past engraved itself
into my muscle memory
ingrained its teachings
and matured my sensibility.

The dim shadows that would creep
And the blues that I would pour
are becoming budding flowers in my chest.

Weaving from the same web
I was entangled in
building from the same sorrows
I was drowning in.

I began connecting,
understanding its stem
stitching my memories.

I write for my younger self
who felt silenced and erased by the world.

I shape all the tainted pieces of memories
into art and paint shades of my past
as each is soaked in a memory.

I craft subconscious relief,
breathing memories
into 6 alphabets
that were strung into paragraphs,
beginnings and end.

I reached out to corners
to bring out
sunrises and sunsets
and reignite dying embers
as I de-spell the damage that silently reverterbrates through generation.

I find home in my skin
and love myself, whole;
Shadows, crevice and all.

A MAN came slowly from the setting sun,
To Emer, raddling raiment in her dun,
And said, "I am that swineherd whom you bid
Go watch the road between the wood and tide,
But now I have no need to watch it more.'
Then Emer cast the web upon the floor,
And raising arms all raddled with the dye,
Parted her lips with a loud sudden cry.
That swineherd stared upon her face and said,
"No man alive, no man among the dead,
Has won the gold his cars of battle bring.'
"But if your master comes home triumphing
Why must you blench and shake from foot to crown?'
Thereon he shook the more and cast him down
Upon the web-heaped floor, and cried his word:
"With him is one sweet-throated like a bird.'
"You dare me to my face,' and thereupon
She smote with raddled fist, and where her son
Herded the cattle came with stumbling feet,
And cried with angry voice, "It is not meet
To ide life away, a common herd.'
"I have long waited, mother, for that word:
But wherefore now?'
"There is a man to die;
You have the heaviest arm under the sky.'
"Whether under its daylight or its stars
My father stands amid his battle-cars.'
"But you have grown to be the taller man.'
"Yet somewhere under starlight or the sun
My father stands.'
"Aged, worn out with wars
On foot.  on horseback or in battle-cars.'
"I only ask what way my journey lies,
For He who made you bitter made you wise.'
"The Red Branch camp in a great company
Between wood's rim and the horses of the sea.
Go there, and light a camp-fire at wood's rim;
But tell your name and lineage to him
Whose blade compels, and wait till they have found
Some feasting man that the same oath has bound.'
Among those feasting men Cuchulain dwelt,
And his young sweetheart close beside him knelt,
Stared on the mournful wonder of his eyes,
Even as Spring upon the ancient skies,
And pondered on the glory of his days;
And all around the harp-string told his praise,
And Conchubar, the Red Branch king of kings,
With his own fingers touched the brazen strings.
At last Cuchulain spake, "Some man has made
His evening fire amid the leafy shade.
I have often heard him singing to and fro,
I have often heard the sweet sound of his bow.
Seek out what man he is.'
One went and came.
"He bade me let all know he gives his name
At the sword-point, and waits till we have found
Some feasting man that the same oath has bound.'
Cuchulain cried, "I am the only man
Of all this host so bound from childhood on.
After short fighting in the leafy shade,
He spake to the young man, 'Is there no maid
Who loves you, no white arms to wrap you round,
Or do you long for the dim sleepy ground,
That you have come and dared me to my face?"
"The dooms of men are in God's hidden place,'
"Your head a while seemed like a woman's head
That I loved once.'
Again the fighting sped,
But now the war-rage in Cuchulain woke,
And through that new blade's guard the old blade
broke,
And pierced him.
"Speak before your breath is done.'
"Cuchulain I, mighty Cuchulain's son.'
"I put you from your pain.  I can no more.'
While day its burden on to evening bore,
With head bowed on his knees Cuchulain stayed;
Then Conchubar sent that sweet-throated maid,
And she, to win him, his grey hair caressed;
In vain her arms, in vain her soft white breast.
Then Conchubar, the subtlest of all men,
Ranking his Druids round him ten by ten,
Spake thus:  "Cuchulain will dwell there and brood
For three days more in dreadful quietude,
And then arise, and raving slay us all.
Chaunt in his ear delusions magical,
That he may fight the horses of the sea.'
The Druids took them to their mystery,
And chaunted for three days.
Cuchulain stirred,
Stared on the horses of the sea, and heard
The cars of battle and his own name cried;
And fought with the invulnerable tide.

i love that word, puttering, my adjective
of early morning rambling, world examining,
in the early AM, treading barefooted
from room to room, a list prestablished,
+ tidy up the prior evening’s laziness,
unload with complete silence the
prior nights dishwasher, homework,
prep the couch back to pre~beat~up presentability,

make the first 16.5 .oz of Blue Mountain
Hawaiian coffee, in my art history
McIntosh mug(1),
prepare the first of the day’s bitesized
edibles,
a:k:a, Kashi crunchies, so the coffee all
falls down  to a well~recv’d internal welcoming

the timing is off, the clock has changed,
it is early but not really, I’m constantly
recalculating ‘real time’ until confused,
substituting the internal locked-in clocking that ultimate divination of right and wrong,
the betting app informs us of the
under/over hours really slept line
set by Las Vegas oddsmakers

but as usual, the digression omens come
fast and furious, up in the sky apartment
is an oasis of cloud quietude,
(where the latitude and longitude
inter-sec, where the cleansed sun softly)

ah quietude, an envelopment noun
favored over the pedestrian quiet,
my ears,
fulfilled by music via noiseless earbuds,
fills the soul, it is the milk in the
morning coffee brew of the
crossover silence, tween the skyed division

check on the woman, deep asleep,
(pronouns: she/her/mine)
her arm thrown across my empty pillow, as if holding my place in line,
like besties in second grade, a warning to other potent interlopers,
so
withdraw silent to finish the routine that
is so comforting, the polit~noise chatter has
not yet invaded, all of its associated
malice’s tumult, kept away at bay
with forethought,
and instead, thus, I, write,

in this quilt of solitude, not alone,
write of this companioned morn~born~rituals that
will be one day,
be renamed,
as a

mourning ritual,

when
when life ruefully states in its
arrogant ~ don’t ~ care, no ways,
now that,

When,
one of us, be
sleeping permanent, and the
silence be reformatted, recalculated,
the coffee will taste different, and
the footfalls no longer unsqueaking,
no need, cause the solitude is just
renamed as loneliness, and though
the tears emanate from same tear ducts,
the causal reasoning is reversed,
no longer
celebratory, and with no one to show it off,
to share,
no punch in the arm gasp
of loving recognition,

I perforce new habit,
will read this puttering,
now stuttering poem

someday as a new summary,
a substitutable morn chore,
absent
a chorus of a
singly
singular
beautiful quiet but only
memorized,
silenced applause

My days are tormented by longing,
So many dreams life did not fulfill,
Longing for the love that never came,
(Yet the gallant heart is hopeful still)

I'm longing to foresee the future -
Just how long will my loneliness last?
Old memories offer no comfort,
So I'm longing to forget the past

I'm longing to know if God exists,
In my mind it still remains unclear;
Who shall I praise for nature's beauty,
Witnessing its wrath, whom shall I fear?

Few praise God in all circumstances,
The faithful pay homage without doubt;
But I'm perplexed by the suffering
Born of disease, war, famine and drought

I'm torn between loving and hating
A God who cannot seem to decide
If wrath or mercy is deserving ....
So both arrive, with hope on the side

I'm weary of this life of longing,
I seek my refuge in solitude;
Abandoning unanswered questions,
I ascend to spheres of quietude

But end of day finds my heart longing
That just one of life's schemes be revealed:
Fearing the reply, still it inquires:
Will love be mine? Or has my fate been sealed!

The same rose, still ablaze scorching red,  
A ****** from realms yet untread,  
That unfolds upon the ancient, earthen bed—  
But heed the thorn; this way one cannot tread.

Every morning the nightingale sings her song,  
Leaps into melody, ere the day grows long.  
Down the moon’s open eye, once strong,  
To unlock the door, one must belong.

In the quietude, beneath the moon’s aged grace,  
Maybe lies a key forged in shadow,
The sun slides down, lights a candle at a silent pace.  
Who claims this boon, who dares to embrace,  
Must know the rose’s fire, the nightingale’s chase.

I made a blog that no-one wants to see.
I might as well have stripped and posted ****.
I should’ve baked a chocolate cake for tea.

I twittered, face-booked, tumblred, endlessly,
but still it languishes in quietude.
I made a blog that no-one wants to see.

I promised video with poetry;
no cliché, hackneyed rhyme or platitudes.
I should’ve baked a chocolate cake for tea.

My blog is but a trickle in the sea
A place of literary solitude.
I made a blog that no-one wants to see.

I treasured all my followers, all three;
and yet, with heavy heart, I must conclude
I made a blog that no-one wants to see.
I should’ve baked a chocolate cake for tea.

Athenian Epitaphs
by Michael R. Burch

These are my modern English translations of ancient Greek epitaphs placed on gravestones and monuments by the ancient Greeks in remembrance of their dead.

Mariner, do not ask whose tomb this may be,
but go with good fortune: I wish you a kinder sea.
—Michael R. Burch, after Plato

Does my soul abide in heaven, or hell?
Only the sea gulls
in their high, lonely circuits may tell.
—Michael R. Burch, after Glaucus

Passerby,
Tell the Spartans we lie
Lifeless at Thermopylae:
Dead at their word,
Obedient to their command.
Have they heard?
Do they understand?
—Michael R. Burch, after Simonides

Since I'm dead sea-enclosed Cyzicus shrouds my bones.
Faretheewell, O my adoptive land that suckled and nurtured me;
Once again I take rest at your breast.
—Michael R. Burch, after Erycius

These men earned a crown of imperishable glory,
nor did the maelstrom of death obscure their story.
—Michael R. Burch, after Simonides

He lies in state tonight: great is his Monument!
Yet Ares cares not, neither does War relent.
—Michael R. Burch, after Anacreon

They observed our fearful fetters,
marched to confront the surrounding darkness;
now we gratefully commemorate their excellence.
Bravely, they died for us.
—Michael R. Burch, after Mnasalcas

Be ashamed, O mountains and seas,
that these valorous men lack breath.
Assume, like pale chattels,
an ashen silence at death.
—Michael R. Burch, after Parmenio

Stripped of her stripling, if asked, she'd confess:
"I am now less than nothingness."
—Michael R. Burch, after Diotimus

Blame not the gale, nor the inhospitable sea-gulf, nor friends' tardiness,
mariner! Just man's foolhardiness.
—Michael R. Burch, after Leonidas of Tarentum

Stranger, flee!
But may Fortune grant you all the prosperity
she denied me.
—Michael R. Burch, after Leonidas of Tarentum

I am loyal to you, master, even in the grave:
just as you now are death's slave.
—Michael R. Burch, after Dioscorides

Having never earned a penny
nor seen a bridal gown address the floor,
still I lie here with the love of many,
to be the love of yet one more.
—Michael R. Burch, after an unknown Greek poet

Little I knew—a child of five—
of what it means to be alive
and all life's little thrills;
but little also—(I was glad not to know)—
of life's great ills.
—Michael R. Burch, after Lucian

I lie by stark Icarian rocks
and only speak when the sea talks.
Please tell my dear father I gave up the ghost
on the Aegean coast.
—Michael R. Burch, after Theatetus

Everywhere the sea is the sea, the dead are the dead.
What difference to me—where I rest my head?
The sea knows I'm buried.
—Michael R. Burch, after Antipater of Sidon

Pity this boy who was beautiful, but died.
Pity his monument, overlooking this hillside.
Pity the world that bore him, then foolishly survived.
—Michael R. Burch, after an unknown Greek poet

Insatiable Death! I was only a child!
Why did you ****** me away, in my infancy,
from those destined to love me?
—Michael R. Burch, after an unknown Greek poet

Tell Nicagoras that Strymonias
at the setting of the Kids
lost his.
—Michael R. Burch, after Nicaenetus

Now his voice is prisoned in the silent pathways of the night:
his owner's faithful Maltese...
but will he still bark again, on sight?
—Michael R. Burch, after Tymnes

Poor partridge, poor partridge, lately migrated from the rocks;
our cat bit off your unlucky head; my offended heart still balks!
I put you back together again and buried you, so unsightly!
May the dark earth cover you heavily: heavily, not lightly...
so she shan't get at you again!
—Michael R. Burch, after Agathias

Dead as you are, though you lie still as stone,
huntress Lycas, my great Thessalonian hound,
the wild beasts still fear your white bones;
craggy Pelion remembers your valor,
splendid Ossa, the way you would bound
and bay at the moon for its whiteness,
bellowing as below we heard valleys resound.
And how brightly with joy you would canter and run
the strange lonely peaks of high Cithaeron!
—Michael R. Burch, after Simonides

Aeschylus, graybeard, son of Euphorion,
died far away in wheat-bearing Gela;
still, the groves of Marathon may murmur of his valor
and the black-haired Mede, with his mournful clarion.
—Michael R. Burch, after Aeschylus

Not Rocky Trachis,
nor the thirsty herbage of Dryophis,
nor this albescent stone
with its dark blue lettering shielding your white bones,
nor the wild Icarian sea dashing against the steep shingles
of Doliche and Dracanon,
nor the empty earth,
nor anything essential of me since birth,
nor anything now mingles
here with the perplexing absence of you,
with what death forces us to abandon...
—Michael R. Burch, after Euphorion

Though they were steadfast among spears, dark Fate destroyed them
as they defended their native land, rich in sheep;
now Ossa's dust seems all the more woeful, where they now sleep.
—Michael R. Burch, after Aeschylus

Sail on, mariner, sail on,
for when we were perishing,
greater ships sailed on.
—Michael R. Burch, after Theodorides

We who left the thunderous surge of the Aegean
of old, now lie here on the mid-plain of Ecbatan:
farewell, dear Athens, nigh to Euboea,
farewell, dear sea!
—Michael R. Burch, after Plato

My friend found me here,
a shipwrecked corpse on the beach.
He heaped these strange boulders above me.
Oh, how he would wail
that he "loved" me,
with many bright tears for his own calamitous life!
Now he sleeps with my wife
and flits like a gull in a gale
—beyond reach—
while my broken bones bleach.
—Michael R. Burch, after Callimachus

All this vast sea is his Monument.
Where does he lie—whether heaven, or hell?
Well friend, perhaps when the gulls repent—
their shriekings may tell.
—Michael R. Burch, after Glaucus

Cloud-capped Geraneia, cruel mountain!
If only you had looked no further than Ister and Scythian
Tanais, had not aided the surge of the Scironian
sea's wild-spurting fountain
filling the dark ravines of snowy Meluriad!
But now he is dead:
a chill corpse in a chillier ocean—moon led—
and only an empty tomb now speaks of the long, windy voyage ahead.
—Michael R. Burch, after Simonides

His white bones lie shining on some inhospitable shore:
a son lost to his father, his tomb empty; the poor-
est beggars have happier mothers!
—Michael R. Burch, after Damegtus

The light of a single morning
exterminated the sacred offspring of Lysidice.
Nor do the angels sing.
Nor do we seek the gods' advice.
This is the grave of Nicander's lost children.
We merely weep at its bitter price.
—Michael R. Burch, after an unknown Greek poet

Pluto, delighting in tears,
why did you bring our son, Ariston,
to the laughterless abyss of death?
Why—why? —did the gods grant him breath,
if only for seven years?
—Michael R. Burch, after an unknown Greek poet

Although I had to leave the sweet sun,
only nineteen—Diogenes, hail! —
beneath the earth, let's have lots more fun:
till human desire seems weak and pale.
—Michael R. Burch, after an unknown Greek poet

Once sweetest of the workfellows,
our shy teller of tall tales
—fleet Crethis! —who excelled
at every childhood game...
now you sleep among long shadows
where everyone's the same...
—Michael R. Burch, after Callimachus

Passing by, passing by my oft-bewailed pillar,
shudder, my new friend to hear my tragic story:
of how my pyre was lit by the same fiery torch
meant to lead the procession to my nuptials in glory!
O Hymenaeus, why did you did change
my bridal song to a dirge? Strange!
—Michael R. Burch, after Erinna

Suddenly this grave
holds our nightingale speechless;
now she lies here like a stone,
who voice was so marvelous;
while sunlight illumining dust
proves the gods all reachless,
as our prayers prove them also
unhearing or beseechless.
—Michael R. Burch, after an unknown Greek poet

I, Homenea, the chattering bright sparrow,
lie here in the hollow of a great affliction,
leaving tears to Atimetus
and all scattered—that great affection.
—Michael R. Burch, after an unknown Greek poet

Wert thou, O Artemis,
overbusy with thy beast-slaying hounds
when the Beast embraced me?
—Michael R. Burch, after Diodorus of Sardis

A mother only as far as the birth pangs,
my life cut short at the height of life's play:
only eighteen years old, so brief was my day.
—Michael R. Burch, after an unknown Greek poet

We mourn Polyanthus, whose wife
placed him newly-wedded in an unmarked grave,
having received his luckless corpse
back from the green Aegean wave
that deposited his fleshless skeleton
gruesomely in the harbor of Torone.
—Michael R. Burch, after Phaedimus

Here Saon, son of Dicon, now rests in holy sleep:
say not that the good die, friend, lest gods and mortals weep.
—Michael R. Burch, after Callimachus

Keywords/Tags: translation, epitaph, epitaphs, eulogy, Ancient Greek, epigram, epigrams, death, mrbepi, grave, funeral, spirit, ghost, memorial, tribute, praise



Epigrams on Life

You begrudge men your virginity?
Why? To what purpose?
You will find no one to embrace you in the grave.
The joys of love are for the living.
But in Acheron, dear ******, we shall all lie dust and ashes.
—Michael R. Burch, after Asclepiades of Samos

Let me live with joy today, since tomorrow is unforeseeable.
—Michael R. Burch, after Palladas of Alexandria



Ibykos/Ibycus Epigrams

Ibycus has been called the most love-mad of poets.

Euryalus, born of the blue-eyed Graces,
scion of the bright-tressed Seasons,
son of the Cyprian,
whom dew-lidded Persuasion birthed among rose-blossoms.
—Ibykos/Ibycus (circa 540 BC), loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Ibykos/Ibycus Fragment 286, circa 564 B.C.
this poem has been titled "The Influence of Spring"
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Come spring, the grand
apple trees stand
watered by a gushing river
where the maidens’ uncut flowers shiver
and the blossoming grape vine swells
in the gathering shadows.

Unfortunately
for me
Eros never rests
but like a Thracian tempest
ablaze with lightning
emanates from Aphrodite;

the results are frightening—
black,
bleak,
astonishing,
violently jolting me from my soles
to my soul.

Originally published by The Chained Muse

Ibykos/Ibycus Fragment 282, circa 540 B.C.
Ibykos fragment 282, Oxyrhynchus papyrus, lines 1-32
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

... They also destroyed the glorious city of Priam, son of Dardanus,
after leaving Argos due to the devices of death-dealing Zeus,
encountering much-sung strife over the striking beauty of auburn-haired Helen,
waging woeful war when destruction rained down on longsuffering Pergamum
thanks to the machinations of golden-haired Aphrodite ...

But now it is not my intention to sing of Paris, the host-deceiver,
nor of slender-ankled Cassandra,
nor of Priam’s other children,
nor of the nameless day of the downfall of high-towered Troy,
nor even of the valour of the heroes who hid in the hollow, many-bolted horse ...

Such was the destruction of Troy.

They were heroic men and Agamemnon was their king,
a king from Pleisthenes,
a son of Atreus, son of a noble father.

The all-wise Muses of Helicon
might recount such tales accurately,
but no mortal man, unblessed,
could ever number those innumerable ships
Menelaus led across the Aegean from Aulos ...

"From Argos they came, the bronze-speared sons of the Achaeans ..."



Anacreon Epigrams

Yes, bring me Homer’s lyre, no doubt,
but first yank the bloodstained strings out!
—Anacreon, translation by Michael R. Burch

Here we find Anacreon,
an elderly lover of boys and wine.
His harp still sings in lonely Acheron
as he thinks of the lads he left behind ...
—Anacreon or the Anacreontea, translation by Michael R. Burch

He lies in state tonight: great is his Monument!
Yet Ares cares not, neither does War relent.
—Michael R. Burch, after Anacreon



Plato Epigrams

These epitaphs and other epigrams have been ascribed to Plato ...

Mariner, do not ask whose tomb this may be,
But go with good fortune: I wish you a kinder sea.
—Michael R. Burch, after Plato

We left the thunderous Aegean
to sleep peacefully here on the plains of Ecbatan.
Farewell, renowned Eretria, our homeland!
Farewell, Athens, Euboea's neighbor!
Farewell, dear Sea!
—Michael R. Burch, after Plato

We who navigated the Aegean’s thunderous storm-surge
now sleep peacefully here on the mid-plains of Ecbatan:
Farewell, renowned Eretria, our homeland!
Farewell, Athens, nigh to Euboea!
Farewell, dear Sea!
—Michael R. Burch, after Plato

This poet was pleasing to foreigners
and even more delightful to his countrymen:
Pindar, beloved of the melodious Muses.
—Michael R. Burch, after Plato

Some say the Muses are nine.
Foolish critics, count again!
Sappho of ****** makes ten.
—Michael R. Burch, after Plato

Even as you once shone, the Star of Morning, vastly above our heads,
even so you now shine, the Star of Evening, eclipsing the dead.
—Michael R. Burch, after Plato

Why do you gaze up at the stars?
Oh, my Star, that I were Heaven,
to gaze at you with many eyes!
—Michael R. Burch, after Plato

Every heart sings an incomplete song,
until another heart sings along.
Those who would love long to join in the chorus.
At a lover’s touch, everyone becomes a poet.
—Michael R. Burch, after Plato

The Apple
ascribed to Plato
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Here’s an apple; if you’re able to love me,
catch it and chuck me your cherry in exchange.
But if you hesitate, as I hope you won’t,
take the apple, examine it carefully,
and consider how briefly its beauty will last.



HOMER TRANSLATIONS

Surrender to sleep at last! What an ordeal, keeping watch all night, wide awake. Soon you’ll succumb to sleep and escape all your troubles. Sleep. — Homer, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Any moment might be our last. Earth’s magnificence? Magnified because we’re doomed. You will never be lovelier than at this moment. We will never pass this way again. — Homer, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Let’s hope the gods are willing. They rule the vaulting skies. They’re stronger than men to plan, execute and realize their ambitions.—Homer, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Passage home? Impossible! Surely you have something else in mind, Goddess, urging me to cross the ocean’s endless expanse in a raft. So vast, so full of danger! Hell, sometimes not even the sea-worthiest ships can prevail, aided as they are by Zeus’s mighty breath! I’ll never set foot on a raft, Goddess, until you swear by all that’s holy you’re not plotting some new intrigue! — Homer, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Few sons surpass their fathers; most fall short, all too few overachieve. — Homer, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Beauty! Ah, Terrible Beauty! A deathless Goddess, she startles our eyes! — Homer, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Many dread seas and many dark mountain ranges lie between us. — Homer, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

The lives of mortal men? Like the leaves’ generations. Now the old leaves fall, blown and scattered by the wind. Soon the living timber bursts forth green buds as spring returns. Even so with men: as one generation is born, another expires. — Homer, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Since I’m attempting to temper my anger, it does not behoove me to rage unrelentingly on. — Homer, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Overpowering memories subsided to grief. Priam wept freely for Hector, who had died crouching at Achilles’ feet, while Achilles wept himself, first for his father, then for Patroclus, as their mutual sobbing filled the house. — Homer, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

“Genius is discovered in adversity, not prosperity.” — Homer, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Ruin, the eldest daughter of Zeus, blinds us all with her fatal madness. With those delicate feet of hers, never touching the earth, she glides over our heads, trapping us all. First she entangles you, then me, in her lethal net. — Homer, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Death and Fate await us all. Soon comes a dawn or noon or sunset when someone takes my life in battle, with a well-flung spear or by whipping a deadly arrow from his bow. — Homer, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Death is the Great Leveler, not even the immortal gods can defend the man they love most when the dread day dawns for him to take his place in the dust.—Homer, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch



Antipater Epigrams

Mnemosyne was stunned into astonishment when she heard honey-tongued Sappho,
wondering how mortal men merited a tenth Muse.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

O Aeolian land, you lightly cover Sappho,
the mortal Muse who joined the Immortals,
whom Cypris and Eros fostered,
with whom Peitho wove undying wreaths,
who was the joy of Hellas and your glory.
O Fates who twine the spindle's triple thread,
why did you not spin undying life
for the singer whose deathless gifts
enchanted the Muses of Helicon?
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Here, O stranger, the sea-crashed earth covers Homer,
herald of heroes' valour,
spokesman of the Olympians,
second sun to the Greeks,
light of the immortal Muses,
the Voice that never diminishes.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

This herald of heroes,
this interpreter of the Immortals,
this second sun shedding light on the life of Greece,
           Homer,
the delight of the Muses,
the ageless voice of the world,
lies dead, O stranger,
washed away with the sea-washed sand ...
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

As high as the trumpet's cry exceeds the thin flute's,
so high above all others your lyre rang;
so much the sweeter your honey than the waxen-celled swarm's.
O Pindar, with your tender lips witness how the horned god Pan
forgot his pastoral reeds when he sang your hymns.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Here lies Pindar, the Pierian trumpet,
the heavy-smiting smith of well-stuck hymns.
Hearing his melodies, one might believe
the immortal Muses possessed bees
to produce heavenly harmonies in the bridal chamber of Cadmus.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Harmonia, the goddess of Harmony, was the bride of Cadmus, so his bridal chamber would have been full of pleasant sounds.

Praise the well-wrought verses of tireless Antimachus,
a man worthy of the majesty of ancient demigods,
whose words were forged on the Muses' anvils.
If you are gifted with a keen ear,
if you aspire to weighty words,
if you would pursue a path less traveled,
if Homer holds the scepter of song,
and yet Zeus is greater than Poseidon,
even so Poseidon his inferior exceeds all other Immortals;
and even so the Colophonian bows before Homer,
but exceeds all other singers.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I, the trumpet that once blew the ****** battle-notes
and the sweet truce-tunes, now hang here, Pherenicus,
your gift to Athena, quieted from my clamorous music.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Behold Anacreon's tomb;
here the Teian swan sleeps with the unmitigated madness of his love for lads.
Still he sings songs of longing on the lyre of Bathyllus
and the albescent marble is perfumed with ivy.
Death has not quenched his desire
and the house of Acheron still burns with the fevers of Cypris.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

May the four-clustered clover, Anacreon,
grow here by your grave,
ringed by the tender petals of the purple meadow-flowers,
and may fountains of white milk bubble up,
and the sweet-scented wine gush forth from the earth,
so that your ashes and bones may experience joy,
if indeed the dead know any delight.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Stranger passing by the simple tomb of Anacreon,
if you found any profit in my books,
please pour drops of your libation on my ashes,
so that my bones, refreshed by wine, may rejoice
that I, who so delighted in the boisterous revels of Dionysus,
and who played such manic music, as wine-drinkers do,
even in death may not travel without Bacchus
in my sojourn to that land to which all men must come.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Anacreon, glory of Ionia,
even in the land of the lost may you never be without your beloved revels,
or your well-loved lyre,
and may you still sing with glistening eyes,
shaking the braided flowers from your hair,
turning always towards Eurypyle, Megisteus, or the locks of Thracian Smerdies,
sipping sweet wine,
your robes drenched with the juices of grapes,
wringing intoxicating nectar from its folds ...
For all your life, old friend, was poured out as an offering to these three:
the Muses, Bacchus, and Love.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Smerdies, also mentioned by the poet Simonides, was a Thracian boy loved by Anacreon. Simonides also mentioned Megisteus. Eurypyle was a girl also mentioned by the poet Dioscorides. So these seem to be names associated with Anacreon. The reference to "locks" apparently has to do with Smerdies having his hair cut by Anacreon's rival for his affections, in a jealous rage.

You sleep amid the dead, Anacreon,
your day-labor done,
your well-loved lyre's sweet tongue silenced
that once sang incessantly all night long.
And Smerdies also sleeps,
the spring-tide of your loves,
for whom, tuning and turning you lyre,
you made music like sweetest nectar.
For you were Love's bullseye,
the lover of lads,
and he had the bow and the subtle archer's craft
to never miss his target.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Erinna's verses were few, nor were her songs overlong,
but her smallest works were inspired.
Therefore she cannot fail to be remembered
and is never lost beneath the shadowy wings of bleak night.
While we, the estranged, the innumerable throngs of tardy singers,
lie in pale corpse-heaps wasting into oblivion.
The moaned song of the lone swan outdoes the cawings of countless jackdaws
echoing far and wide through darkening clouds.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Who hung these glittering shields here,
these unstained spears and unruptured helmets,
dedicating to murderous Ares ornaments of no value?
Will no one cast these virginal weapons out of my armory?
Their proper place is in the peaceful halls of placid men,
not within the wild walls of Enyalius.
I delight in hacked heads and the blood of dying berserkers,
if, indeed, I am Ares the Destroyer.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

May good Fortune, O stranger, keep you on course all your life before a fair breeze!
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Docile doves may coo for cowards,
but we delight in dauntless men.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Here by the threshing-room floor,
little ant, you relentless toiler,
I built you a mound of liquid-absorbing earth,
so that even in death you may partake of the droughts of Demeter,
as you lie in the grave my plough burrowed.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

This is your mother’s lament, Artemidorus,
weeping over your tomb,
bewailing your twelve brief years:
"All the fruit of my labor has gone up in smoke,
all your heartbroken father's endeavors are ash,
all your childish passion an extinguished flame.
For you have entered the land of the lost,
from which there is no return, never a home-coming.
You failed to reach your prime, my darling,
and now we have nothing but your headstone and dumb dust."
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Everywhere the sea is the sea, the dead are the dead.
What difference to me—where I rest my head?
The sea knows I’m buried.
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Everywhere the Sea is the Sea
by Antipater of Sidon
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Everywhere the Sea is the same;
why then do we idly blame
the Cyclades
or the harrowing waves of narrow Helle?

To protest is vain!

Justly, they have earned their fame.

Why then,
after I had escaped them,
did the harbor of Scarphe engulf me?

I advise whoever finds a fair passage home:
accept that the sea's way is its own.

Man is foam.

Aristagoras knows who's buried here.

Orpheus, mute your bewitching strains
by Antipater of Sidon
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Orpheus, mute your bewitching strains;
Leave beasts to wander stony plains;
No longer sing fierce winds to sleep,
Nor seek to enchant the tumultuous deep;
For you are dead; each Muse, forlorn,
Strums anguished strings as your mother mourns.
Mind, mere mortals, mind—no use to moan,
When even a Goddess could not save her own!

Orpheus, now you will never again enchant
by Antipater of Sidon
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Orpheus, now you will never again enchant the charmed oaks,
never again mesmerize shepherdless herds of wild beasts,
never again lull the roaring winds,
never again tame the tumultuous hail
nor the sweeping snowstorms
nor the crashing sea,
for you have perished
and the daughters of Mnemosyne weep for you,
and your mother Calliope above all.
Why do mortals mourn their dead sons,
when not even the gods can protect their children from Hades?
—Antipater of Sidon, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

The High Road to Death
by Antipater of Sidon
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Men skilled in the stars call me brief-lifed;
I am, but what do I care, O Seleucus?
All men descend to Hades
and if our demise comes quicker,
the sooner we shall we look on Minos.
Let us drink then, for surely wine is a steed for the high-road,
when pedestrians march sadly to Death.

The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World
by Antipater of Sidon
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I have set my eyes upon
the lofty walls of Babylon
with its elevated road for chariots

... and upon the statue of Zeus
by the Alpheus ...

... and upon the hanging gardens ...

... upon the Colossus of the Sun ...

... upon the massive edifices
of the towering pyramids ...

... even upon the vast tomb of Mausolus ...

but when I saw the mansion of Artemis
disappearing into the cirri,
those other marvels lost their brilliancy
and I said, "Setting aside Olympus,
the Sun never shone on anything so fabulous!"



Erinna Epigrams

This portrait is the work of sensitive, artistic hands.
See, noble Prometheus, you have human equals!
For if whoever painted this girl had only added a voice,
she would have been Agatharkhis entirely.
—Erinna, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Erinna is generally considered to be second only to Sappho as an ancient Greek female poet. Little is known about her life; Erinna has been called a contemporary of Sappho and her most gifted student, but she may have lived up to a few hundred years later. This poem, about a portrait of a girl or young woman named Agatharkhis, has been called the earliest Greek ekphrastic epigram (an epigram describing a work of art).

Passing by, passing by my oft-bewailed pillar,
shudder, my new friend to hear my tragic story:
of how my pyre was lit by the same fiery torch
meant to lead the procession to my nuptials in glory!
O Hymenaeus, why did you did change
my bridal song to a dirge? Strange!
—Erinna, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

You, my tall Columns, and you, my small Urn,
the receptacle of Hades’ tiny pittance of ash—
remember me to those who pass by
my grave, as they dash.
Tell them my story, as sad as it is:
that this grave sealed a young bride’s womb;
that my name was Baucis and Telos my land;
and that Erinna, my friend, etched this poem on my Tomb.
—Erinna, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Translator’s note: Baucis is also spelled Baukis. Erinna has been attributed to different locations, including ******, Rhodes, Teos, Telos and Tenos. Telos seems the most likely because of her Dorian dialect. Erinna wrote in a mixture of Aeolic and Doric Greek. In 1928, Italian archaeologists excavating at Oxyrhynchus discovered a tattered piece of papyrus which contained 54 lines Erinna’s lost epic, the poem “Distaff.” This work, like the epigram above, was also about her friend Baucis.

Excerpts from “Distaff”
by Erinna
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

… the moon rising …
… leaves falling …
… waves lapping a windswept shore …

… and our childish games, Baucis, do you remember? ...

... Leaping from white horses,
running on reckless feet through the great courtyard.
“You’re it!’ I cried, ‘You’re the Tortoise now!”
But when your turn came to pursue your pursuers,
you darted beyond the courtyard,
dashed out deep into the waves,
splashing far beyond us …

… My poor Baucis, these tears I now weep are your warm memorial,
these traces of embers still smoldering in my heart
for our silly amusements, now that you lie ash …

… Do you remember how, as girls,
we played at weddings with our dolls,
pretending to be brides in our innocent beds? ...

... How sometimes I was your mother,
allotting wool to the weaver-women,
calling for you to unreel the thread? ...

… Do you remember our terror of the monster Mormo
with her huge ears, her forever-flapping tongue,
her four slithering feet, her shape-shifting face? ...

... Until you mother called for us to help with the salted meat ...

... But when you mounted your husband’s bed,
dearest Baucis, you forgot your mothers’ warnings!
Aphrodite made your heart forgetful ...

... Desire becomes oblivion ...

... Now I lament your loss, my dearest friend.
I can’t bear to think of that dark crypt.
I can’t bring myself to leave the house.
I refuse to profane your corpse with my tearless eyes.
I refuse to cut my hair, but how can I mourn with my hair unbound?
I blush with shame at the thought of you! …

... But in this dark house, O my dearest Baucis,
My deep grief is ripping me apart.
Wretched Erinna! Only nineteen,
I moan like an ancient crone, eying this strange distaff ...

O *****! . . . O Hymenaeus! . . .
Alas, my poor Baucis!

On a Betrothed Girl
by Erinna
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I sing of Baucis the bride.
Observing her tear-stained crypt
say this to Death who dwells underground:
"Thou art envious, O Death!"

Her vivid monument tells passers-by
of the bitter misfortune of Baucis —
how her father-in-law burned the poor ******* a pyre
lit by bright torches meant to light her marriage train home.
While thou, O Hymenaeus, transformed her harmonious bridal song into a chorus of wailing dirges.

*****! O Hymenaeus!



Sappho Epigrams

Sappho, fragment 155
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

A short revealing frock?
It's just my luck
your lips were made to mock!

(Pollux wrote: "Sappho used the word beudos [Βεῦδοσ] for a woman's dress, a kimbericon, a kind of short transparent frock.")

Sappho, fragment 156
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

She keeps her scents
in a dressing-case.
And her sense?
In some undiscoverable place.

(Phrynichus wrote: "Sappho calls a woman's dressing-case, where she keeps her scents and such things, grutê [γρύτη].")

Sappho, fragment 47
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Eros harrows my heart:
wild winds whipping desolate mountains,
uprooting oaks.

The poem above is my favorite Sappho epigram. The metaphor of Eros (****** desire) harrowing mountain slopes, leveling oaks and leaving them desolate, is really something―truly powerful and evocative. According to Edwin Marion ***, this Sapphic epigram was "Quoted by Maximus Tyrius about 150 B.C. He speaks of Socrates exciting Phaedus to madness, when he speaks of love."

Improve yourself by others' writings, attaining freely what they purchased at the expense of experience. — Socrates, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch



Ancient Roman Epigrams

Wall, I'm astonished that you haven't collapsed,
since you're holding up verses so prolapsed!
—Ancient Roman graffiti, translation by Michael R. Burch



Incompatibles
by Michael R. Burch

Reason’s treason!
cries the Heart.

Love’s insane,
replies the Brain.

Originally published by Light



The Greatest of These ...
by Michael R. Burch

The hands that held me tremble.
The arms that lifted
  fall.

Angelic flesh, now parchment,
is held together with gauze.

But her undimmed eyes still embrace me;
there infinity can be found.

I can almost believe such love
will reach me, underground.



PRINCESS DIANA POEMS

Fairest Diana
by Michael R. Burch

Fairest Diana, princess of dreams,
born to be loved and yet distant and lone,
why did you linger―so solemn, so lovely―
an orchid ablaze in a crevice of stone?

Was not your heart meant for tenderest passions?
Surely your lips―for wild kisses, not vows!
Why then did you languish, though lustrous, becoming
a pearl of enchantment cast before sows?

Fairest Diana, as fragile as lilac,
as willful as rainfall, as true as the rose;
how did a stanza of silver-bright verse
come to be bound in a book of dull prose?

Published by Tucumcari Literary Journal and Night Roses



Will There Be Starlight
for Princess Diana
by Michael R. Burch

Will there be starlight
tonight
while she gathers
damask
and lilac
and sweet-scented heathers?

And will she find flowers,
or will she find thorns
guarding the petals
of roses unborn?

Will there be starlight
tonight
while she gathers
seashells
and mussels
and albatross feathers?

And will she find treasure
or will she find pain
at the end of this rainbow
of moonlight on rain?



She Was Very Strange, and Beautiful
for Princess Diana
by Michael R. Burch

She was very strange, and beautiful,
like a violet mist enshrouding hills
before night falls
when the hoot owl calls
and the cricket trills
and the envapored moon hangs low and full.

She was very strange, in a pleasant way,
as the hummingbird
flies madly still,
so I drank my fill
of her every word.
What she knew of love, she demurred to say.

She was meant to leave, as the wind must blow,
as the sun must set,
as the rain must fall.
Though she gave her all,
we had nothing left...
yet we smiled, bereft, in her receding glow.



The Peripheries of Love
for Princess Diana
by Michael R. Burch

Through waning afternoons we glide
the watery peripheries of love.
A silence, a quietude falls.

Above us―the sagging pavilions of clouds.
Below us―rough pebbles slowly worn smooth
grate in the gentle turbulence
of yesterday’s forgotten rains.

Later, the moon like a ******
lifts her stricken white face
and the waters rise
toward some unfathomable shore.

We sway gently in the wake
of what stirs beneath us,
yet leaves us unmoved...
curiously motionless,

as though twilight might blur
the effects of proximity and distance,
as though love might be near―

as near
as a single cupped tear of resilient dew
or a long-awaited face.



The Aery Faery Princess
for Princess Diana
by Michael R. Burch

There once was a princess lighter than fluff
made of such gossamer stuff―
the down of a thistle, butterflies’ wings,
the faintest high note the hummingbird sings,
moonbeams on garlands, stands of bright hair...
I think she’s just you when you’re floating on air.



I Pray Tonight
for Princess Diana
by Michael R. Burch

I pray tonight
the starry light
might
surround you.

I pray
by day
that, come what may,
no dark thing confound you.

I pray ere tomorrow
an end to your sorrow.
May angels' white chorales
sing, and astound you.



Sweet Rose of Virtue
by William Dunbar 1460-1525
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

Sweet rose of virtue and of gentleness,
delightful lily of youthful wantonness,
richest in bounty and in beauty clear
and in every virtue that is held most dear―
except only that death is merciless.

Into your garden, today, I followed you;
there I saw flowers of freshest hue,
both white and red, delightful to see,
and wholesome herbs, waving resplendently―
yet everywhere, no odor but rue.

I fear that March with his last arctic blast
has slain my fair rose of pallid and gentle cast,
whose piteous death does my heart such pain
that, if I could, I would compose her roots again―
so comforting her bowering leaves have been.

Ah,
but where are my friends?

I envy those who
sleep beneath the ground
as I toss and turn
beneath my sheets.

The rain coats the windows,
the clear paint on the wooden walls,
sheets of gray steel on the sidewalk,
blank faces in the windows--

the quietude, the quaintness, the
quilt of rain in the forests
and dripping from the roofs.

And where are my friends?

Away, miles away,
far from my wet eyes.

Somethings false
somethings true
somethings are
too true

the elements looked inside my brain
said this man needs some storm rain wind
to aid and abet his pernicious melancholic

too true

worries list and complain ain't gonna do,
put when a revelation slips out
that touches the highest priority
pain points
writing poetry
can't help
even and especially if

too true

like to tell you I am happy to be alive
but that would be a lie

somewhere behind my forehead is
an amorphous ache that only goes quietude
but Cain marked never disappears.

you can't take it with you,
happiness seems to have a shelf life,
a half life, that cuts the time you get to get it
in half.

but the amorphous ache
you call depression
that I call
desperation
has no life,
it just never dies

Rain, flooding and wind advisories
come to mix and match
the desperation that is
pill-proof

they don't laugh at me,
cause they know
desperation is
too true.

The Peripheries of Love
by Michael R. Burch

Through waning afternoons we glide
the watery peripheries of love.
A silence, a quietude falls.

Above us—the darkening pavilions of clouds.
Below us—rough pebbles slowly worn smooth
grate in the gentle turbulence
of yesterday’s forgotten rains.

Later, the moon like a ******
lifts her stricken white face
and the waters rise
toward some unfathomable shore.

We sway gently in the wake
of what stirs beneath us,
yet leaves us unmoved ...
curiously motionless,

as though twilight might blur
the effects of proximity and distance,
as though love might be near—

as near
as a single cupped tear of resilient dew
or a long-awaited face.

Published by Romantics Quarterly, Poetry Magazine, Boston Poetry Magazine, Triplopia, Shadows Ink, E Mobius Pi, Underground Poets, Emotions Literary Magazine, Grassroots Poetry, Poetry Webring, Poetically Speaking, The Poetic Muse, Poet’s Haven, Poetic Voices, Nutty Stories (South Africa) and Gostinaya (in a Russian translation by Yelena Dubrovin)

Keywords/Tags: Love, face, recognition, water, silence, quietude, quiet, turbulence, clouds, pavilions, moon, white, pale, stricken, ******, water, wake

“The Weight of the Untold” (Pradip)
<•>
6:55am:  Jan 2 nine twenty twenty five

(read the comments first)

enveloped by the early mix
of morning’s hangover of dark
blue gray, window glints of a
sun playing peekaboo over the
yet there (!) Manhattan skyline,
the utter  “ness” of the stilled,
unwritten, unstirred, uncolored
dim of medium shadowy light,
the quietude is an actual thing,
a warming coverlet of cozy peace

am I not forcibly compelled to
write of the weight of white spaces,
Pradip pokes my curious anxiety,
as I question my own words, that
he tosses back to me, so so oft
he ****** the cells of my fingertips
to peek, to bleed, then peck letters
from within, to comprehend my
museum artifacts of words,
the weight of their panoply
of mystery

How, how can the white weight of
our seemingly empty spaces tween
words, carry this burden on its,
bony shoulders, can’t we just let them
be, like the breaths exhaled, the
disappearing exhaust of being human,

is it necessary to carry knowing knowledge,
of what needs no body, isn’t the inexplicable
better left unimagined, there be so much tolling troubles, let them be left masked, they’ll appear as embodied black letters, of-when, their discord is accorded their moment of due…no  more need to succumb prematurely
to this onerous lighter than air pressurized crushing atmosphere of reused oxygen

did I awake just to prove my existence, to offer up this combination of vocabulary of wondering, one more explication of the unknowns that are visible to the naked eyes, big, hard, factuals better left alone…and suddenly the morning light has arrived,

dear god,it will be a sun-filled sky,
and that weight, is modestly eased,
never fully erased, but you know,
I know, most of its occupants
even those
who won’t show their faces

And perhaps they should remain
hidden in the white spaces
between the letters and the words,

u.  n.  t.  o.  l.  d.