You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin' in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may **** me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

Consider Icarus, pasting those sticky wings on,
testing that strange little tug at his shoulder blade,
and think of that first flawless moment over the lawn
of the labyrinth. Think of the difference it made!
There below are the trees, as awkward as camels;
and here are the shocked starlings pumping past
and think of innocent Icarus who is doing quite well.
Larger than a sail, over the fog and the blast
of the plushy ocean, he goes. Admire his wings!
Feel the fire at his neck and see how casually
he glances up and is caught, wondrously tunneling
into that hot eye. Who cares that he fell back to the sea?
See him acclaiming the sun and come plunging down
while his sensible daddy goes straight into town.

Thus did they make their moan throughout the city, while the
Achaeans when they reached the Hellespont went back every man to his
own ship. But Achilles would not let the Myrmidons go, and spoke to
his brave comrades saying, “Myrmidons, famed horsemen and my own
trusted friends, not yet, forsooth, let us unyoke, but with horse
and chariot draw near to the body and mourn Patroclus, in due honour
to the dead. When we have had full comfort of lamentation we will
unyoke our horses and take supper all of us here.”
  On this they all joined in a cry of wailing and Achilles led them in
their lament. Thrice did they drive their chariots all sorrowing round
the body, and Thetis stirred within them a still deeper yearning.
The sands of the seashore and the men’s armour were wet with their
weeping, so great a minister of fear was he whom they had lost.
Chief in all their mourning was the son of Peleus: he laid his
bloodstained hand on the breast of his friend. “Fare well,” he
cried, “Patroclus, even in the house of Hades. I will now do all
that I erewhile promised you; I will drag Hector hither and let dogs
devour him raw; twelve noble sons of Trojans will I also slay before
your pyre to avenge you.”
  As he spoke he treated the body of noble Hector with contumely,
laying it at full length in the dust beside the bier of Patroclus. The
others then put off every man his armour, took the horses from their
chariots, and seated themselves in great multitude by the ship of
the fleet descendant of Aeacus, who thereon feasted them with an
abundant funeral banquet. Many a goodly ox, with many a sheep and
bleating goat did they butcher and cut up; many a tusked boar
moreover, fat and well-fed, did they singe and set to roast in the
flames of Vulcan; and rivulets of blood flowed all round the place
where the body was lying.
  Then the princes of the Achaeans took the son of Peleus to
Agamemnon, but hardly could they persuade him to come with them, so
wroth was he for the death of his comrade. As soon as they reached
Agamemnon’s tent they told the serving-men to set a large tripod
over the fire in case they might persuade the son of Peleus ‘to wash
the clotted gore from this body, but he denied them sternly, and swore
it with a solemn oath, saying, “Nay, by King Jove, first and mightiest
of all gods, it is not meet that water should touch my body, till I
have laid Patroclus on the flames, have built him a barrow, and shaved
my head—for so long as I live no such second sorrow shall ever draw
nigh me. Now, therefore, let us do all that this sad festival demands,
but at break of day, King Agamemnon, bid your men bring wood, and
provide all else that the dead may duly take into the realm of
darkness; the fire shall thus burn him out of our sight the sooner,
and the people shall turn again to their own labours.”
  Thus did he speak, and they did even as he had said. They made haste
to prepare the meal, they ate, and every man had his full share so
that all were satisfied. As soon as they had had had enough to eat and
drink, the others went to their rest each in his own tent, but the son
of Peleus lay grieving among his Myrmidons by the shore of the
sounding sea, in an open place where the waves came surging in one
after another. Here a very deep slumber took hold upon him and eased
the burden of his sorrows, for his limbs were weary with chasing
Hector round windy Ilius. Presently the sad spirit of Patroclus drew
near him, like what he had been in stature, voice, and the light of
his beaming eyes, clad, too, as he had been clad in life. The spirit
hovered over his head and said-
  “You sleep, Achilles, and have forgotten me; you loved me living,
but now that I am dead you think for me no further. Bury me with all
speed that I may pass the gates of Hades; the ghosts, vain shadows
of men that can labour no more, drive me away from them; they will not
yet suffer me to join those that are beyond the river, and I wander
all desolate by the wide gates of the house of Hades. Give me now your
hand I pray you, for when you have once given me my dues of fire,
never shall I again come forth out of the house of Hades. Nevermore
shall we sit apart and take sweet counsel among the living; the
cruel fate which was my birth-right has yawned its wide jaws around
me—nay, you too Achilles, peer of gods, are doomed to die beneath the
wall of the noble Trojans.
  “One prayer more will I make you, if you will grant it; let not my
bones be laid apart from yours, Achilles, but with them; even as we
were brought up together in your own home, what time Menoetius brought
me to you as a child from Opoeis because by a sad spite I had killed
the son of Amphidamas—not of set purpose, but in childish quarrel
over the dice. The knight Peleus took me into his house, entreated
me kindly, and named me to be your squire; therefore let our bones lie
in but a single urn, the two-handled golden vase given to you by
your mother.”
  And Achilles answered, “Why, true heart, are you come hither to
lay these charges upon me? will of my own self do all as you have
bidden me. Draw closer to me, let us once more throw our arms around
one another, and find sad comfort in the sharing of our sorrows.”
  He opened his arms towards him as he spoke and would have clasped
him in them, but there was nothing, and the spirit vanished as a
vapour, gibbering and whining into the earth. Achilles sprang to his
feet, smote his two hands, and made lamentation saying, “Of a truth
even in the house of Hades there are ghosts and phantoms that have
no life in them; all night long the sad spirit of Patroclus has
hovered over head making piteous moan, telling me what I am to do
for him, and looking wondrously like himself.”
  Thus did he speak and his words set them all weeping and mourning
about the poor dumb dead, till rosy-fingered morn appeared. Then
King Agamemnon sent men and mules from all parts of the camp, to bring
wood, and Meriones, squire to Idomeneus, was in charge over them. They
went out with woodmen’s axes and strong ropes in their hands, and
before them went the mules. Up hill and down dale did they go, by
straight ways and crooked, and when they reached the heights of
many-fountained Ida, they laid their axes to the roots of many a
tall branching oak that came thundering down as they felled it. They
split the trees and bound them behind the mules, which then wended
their way as they best could through the thick brushwood on to the
plain. All who had been cutting wood bore logs, for so Meriones squire
to Idomeneus had bidden them, and they threw them down in a line
upon the seashore at the place where Achilles would make a mighty
monument for Patroclus and for himself.
  When they had thrown down their great logs of wood over the whole
ground, they stayed all of them where they were, but Achilles
ordered his brave Myrmidons to gird on their armour, and to yoke
each man his horses; they therefore rose, girded on their armour and
mounted each his chariot—they and their charioteers with them. The
chariots went before, and they that were on foot followed as a cloud
in their tens of thousands after. In the midst of them his comrades
bore Patroclus and covered him with the locks of their hair which they
cut off and threw upon his body. Last came Achilles with his head
bowed for sorrow, so noble a comrade was he taking to the house of
Hades.
  When they came to the place of which Achilles had told them they
laid the body down and built up the wood. Achilles then bethought
him of another matter. He went a space away from the pyre, and cut off
the yellow lock which he had let grow for the river Spercheius. He
looked all sorrowfully out upon the dark sea, and said, “Spercheius,
in vain did my father Peleus vow to you that when I returned home to
my loved native land I should cut off this lock and offer you a holy
hecatomb; fifty she-goats was I to sacrifice to you there at your
springs, where is your grove and your altar fragrant with
burnt-offerings. Thus did my father vow, but you have not fulfilled
his prayer; now, therefore, that I shall see my home no more, I give
this lock as a keepsake to the hero Patroclus.”
  As he spoke he placed the lock in the hands of his dear comrade, and
all who stood by were filled with yearning and lamentation. The sun
would have gone down upon their mourning had not Achilles presently
said to Agamemnon, “Son of Atreus, for it is to you that the people
will give ear, there is a time to mourn and a time to cease from
mourning; bid the people now leave the pyre and set about getting
their dinners: we, to whom the dead is dearest, will see to what is
wanted here, and let the other princes also stay by me.”
  When King Agamemnon heard this he dismissed the people to their
ships, but those who were about the dead heaped up wood and built a
pyre a hundred feet this way and that; then they laid the dead all
sorrowfully upon the top of it. They flayed and dressed many fat sheep
and oxen before the pyre, and Achilles took fat from all of them and
wrapped the body therein from head to foot, heaping the flayed
carcases all round it. Against the bier he leaned two-handled jars
of honey and unguents; four proud horses did he then cast upon the
pyre, groaning the while he did so. The dead hero had had
house-dogs; two of them did Achilles slay and threw upon the pyre;
he also put twelve brave sons of noble Trojans to the sword and laid
them with the rest, for he was full of bitterness and fury. Then he
committed all to the resistless and devouring might of the fire; he
groaned aloud and callid on his dead comrade by name. “Fare well,”
he cried, “Patroclus, even in the house of Hades; I am now doing all
that I have promised you. Twelve brave sons of noble Trojans shall the
flames consume along with yourself, but dogs, not fire, shall devour
the flesh of Hector son of Priam.”
  Thus did he vaunt, but the dogs came not about the body of Hector,
for Jove’s daughter Venus kept them off him night and day, and
anointed him with ambrosial oil of roses that his flesh might not be
torn when Achilles was dragging him about. Phoebus Apollo moreover
sent a dark cloud from heaven to earth, which gave shade to the
whole place where Hector lay, that the heat of the sun might not parch
his body.
  Now the pyre about dead Patroclus would not kindle. Achilles
therefore bethought him of another matter; he went apart and prayed to
the two winds Boreas and Zephyrus vowing them goodly offerings. He
made them many drink-offerings from the golden cup and besought them
to come and help him that the wood might make haste to kindle and
the dead bodies be consumed. Fleet Iris heard him praying and
started off to fetch the winds. They were holding high feast in the
house of boisterous Zephyrus when Iris came running up to the stone
threshold of the house and stood there, but as soon as they set eyes
on her they all came towards her and each of them called her to him,
but Iris would not sit down. “I cannot stay,” she said, “I must go
back to the streams of Oceanus and the land of the Ethiopians who
are offering hecatombs to the immortals, and I would have my share;
but Achilles prays that Boreas and shrill Zephyrus will come to him,
and he vows them goodly offerings; he would have you blow upon the
pyre of Patroclus for whom all the Achaeans are lamenting.”
  With this she left them, and the two winds rose with a cry that rent
the air and swept the clouds before them. They blew on and on until
they came to the sea, and the waves rose high beneath them, but when
they reached Troy they fell upon the pyre till the mighty flames
roared under the blast that they blew. All night long did they blow
hard and beat upon the fire, and all night long did Achilles grasp his
double cup, drawing wine from a mixing-bowl of gold, and calling
upon the spirit of dead Patroclus as he poured it upon the ground
until the earth was drenched. As a father mourns when he is burning
the bones of his bridegroom son whose death has wrung the hearts of
his parents, even so did Achilles mourn while burning the body of
his comrade, pacing round the bier with piteous groaning and
lamentation.
  At length as the Morning Star was beginning to herald the light
which saffron-mantled Dawn was soon to suffuse over the sea, the
flames fell and the fire began to die. The winds then went home beyond
the Thracian sea, which roared and boiled as they swept over it. The
son of Peleus now turned away from the pyre and lay down, overcome
with toil, till he fell into a sweet slumber. Presently they who
were about the son of Atreus drew near in a body, and roused him
with the noise and ***** of their coming. He sat upright and said,
“Son of Atreus, and all other princes of the Achaeans, first pour
red wine everywhere upon the fire and quench it; let us then gather
the bones of Patroclus son of Menoetius, singling them out with
care; they are easily found, for they lie in the middle of the pyre,
while all else, both men and horses, has been thrown in a heap and
burned at the outer edge. We will lay the bones in a golden urn, in
two layers of fat, against the time when I shall myself go down into
the house of Hades. As for the barrow, labour not to raise a great one
now, but such as is reasonable. Afterwards, let those Achaeans who may
be left at the ships when I am gone, build it both broad and high.”
  Thus he spoke and they obeyed the word of the son of Peleus. First
they poured red wine upon the thick layer of ashes and quenched the
fire. With many tears they singled out the whitened bones of their
loved comrade and laid them within a golden urn in two layers of
fat: they then covered the urn with a linen cloth and took it inside
the tent. They marked off the circle where the barrow should be,
made a foundation for it about the pyre, and forthwith heaped up the
earth. When they had thus raised a mound they were going away, but
Achilles stayed the people and made them sit in assembly. He brought
prizes from the ships-cauldrons, tripods, horses and mules, noble
oxen, women with fair girdles, and swart iron.
  The first prize he offered was for the chariot races—a woman
skilled in all useful arts, and a three-legged cauldron that had
ears for handles, and would hold twenty-two measures. This was for the
man who came in first. For the second there was a six-year old mare,
unbroken, and in foal to a he-***; the third was to have a goodly
cauldron that had never yet been on the fire; it was still bright as
when it left the maker, and would hold four measures. The fourth prize
was two talents of gold, and the fifth a two-handled urn as yet
unsoiled by smoke. Then he stood up and spoke among the Argives
saying-
  “Son of Atreus, and all other Achaeans, these are the prizes that
lie waiting the winners of the chariot races. At any other time I
should carry off the first prize and take it to my own tent; you
know how far my steeds excel all others—for they are immortal;
Neptune gave them to my father Peleus, who in his turn gave them to
myself; but I shall hold aloof, I and my steeds that have lost their
brave and kind driver, who many a time has washed them in clear
water and anointed their manes with oil. See how they stand weeping
here, with their manes trailing on the ground in the extremity of
their sorrow. But do you others set yourselves in order throughout the
host, whosoever has confidence in his horses and in the strength of
his chariot.”
  Thus spoke the son of Peleus and the drivers of chariots bestirred
themselves. First among them all uprose Eumelus, king of men, son of
Admetus, a man excellent in horsemanship. Next to him rose mighty
Diomed son of Tydeus; he yoked the Trojan horses which he had taken
from Aeneas, when Apollo bore him out of the fight. Next to him,
yellow-haired Menelaus son of Atreus rose and yoked his fleet
horses, Agamemnon’s mare Aethe, and his own horse Podargus. The mare
had been given to Agamemnon by echepolus son of Anchises, that he
might not have to follow him to Ilius, but might stay at home and take
his ease; for Jove had endowed him with great wealth and he lived in
spacious

I etch marks in my skin whenever he  touches me, In the places where his hands wondrously wander as if to erase the feelings he once gave me

I feel a simple joy
As I look upon the hills
The kind that uplifts my heart
Without the skiing thrills.

The trees look their best
All dressed in multi-coloured hues
And stretch for miles around
Against skies of brightest blues.

And as I watch the sun,
Rise from the other side;
I see life stirring out,
From where at night it hides.

The sky gets filled with colour:
To a warm tangerine-orange glow;
And my mind is filled with awe,
At this wondrously delightful show.

Some birds have started
Singing their happy whistling tunes;
And will continue with their songs,
Till its way past noon.

There are some that have started
Before the day broke into dawn,
And unite with the melodies
Of those who start later in the morn.

And these very merry sounds
So full of happy cheer
Makes the state of Kashmir,
Our very prized frontier.

The sounds are echoed far and wide
On this mountainous terrain
Over hills and through valleys
They reach below to the plains.

At night it gets all quiet,
Except for the babbling brook
And the occasional hoot of the owl
That startles me from my book.

With my face over her hair fallen neck
sending through my lips
what I’ve dreamed of compiled tastes

One arm wrapped her waist
The spinal curve of her back
Give-way my others embrace

In my palm falling slowly
with surrendered hold
Her reclining body takes plunge

A body wondrously dreamt by the Gods
but never to beholden
For that vessel has since long belonged
And in a quiet covet,
the Gods continue to sin

Over and across the bed
Released from my grip

Upwards into her hairline
a sweat spreading mist

Grabbing a fistful of mane
I’d lay down on the runway to attain
this flowing coat between my fingers

For the length of time
her hair has entwined me in cuffs

Pulling harder
I gladly yield in acceptance
this braid given stain
a permanent scar

Slow let go of her feathers tangled

In her neck I’m keeping
a burrow in repose

Seeing buttons undone in sync
to expose

The destination of my lips next imprint
like advanced shadowing hints

In a mechanical motion

Hair pulling emotion

Triggers upward
her chest and chin

Two spotlights on the ceiling what her ******* up send
Shaping her back an arc
like a half moons descent  

When she finishes her unbuttoning
Next for my belt she reaches
then the unzip I’ll never forget

She takes me in invest

I take her in continuous shooting

All the unfastened
unclothed

Now Firm
Quake
Earned
And Shake
The peak is reached from this encounter
defined by a collection of far to many lustfully seductive
mental hive of trapped aches
Then I kiss her lips in return she kisses me back, felt...

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I’ll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
‘Cause I walk like I’ve got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I’ll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops,
Weakened by my soulful cries?

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don’t you take it awful hard
‘Cause I laugh like I’ve got gold mines
Diggin’ in my own backyard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may **** me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I’ll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I’ve got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history’s shame
I rise
Up from a past that’s rooted in pain
I rise
I’m a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.

Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.
From And Still I Rise by Maya Angelou. Copyright © 1978 by Maya Angelou.

Before the birds and the bees the sun and the moon
without stars in the sky nor the land nor the dune

Not a sea not a plant not a tree not an ant
there was not a wildebeest nor an elephant

Just one small room
was the Craftsman's dark tomb

He toiled unstoppably without night nor day
in the blackened room he was bound to stay

for eternity the Craftsman seemed doomed
to continuum to be stuck in the loom

Blindly toiling in the binding shadow
with black tools viciously hallow

hammers and nails mud clay ashen bricks
marble chisel mortar pestle tricks

Monotony sparked the craftsman's lost temper
the wall became canvas for angry distemper

His artistic equipment brushed the prison walls
hour upon hour O' mighty hammer falls

He hammered until it whittled away
his fists were red raw like the break of day

The Craftsman was caked in saddened rough sweat
dejection on brow heavy did get

The Craftsman let his head fall low
out of the wall did a light show

A peephole smaller than a rat's tail
was broken wide in the prison cell

Wondrously untamed the light spilled
rolling and soaking all was filled

With light's glory the Craftsman could not see
another blindness that harsh bright brought be

His tools and materials all were a beautiful gleam
the Craftsman pleasantly content with the scene

Slowly but surely the room was filled
and then his neck almost needed t'be gilled

Lacking a need and bound to drown
he singularly thought his problem profound

The Craftsman deftly picked up his tools
and set to building collective pools

To contain flowing light
he took all his might

and built wholly right
a fountain delight

Artistic wonders into his structure
of beast and nature all perfect sculpture

Of timber and clay of marble and grass
he worked until the fountain's completion at last

In the Craftsman's abode was the most beautiful fountain
which all of the light was collectively bound in

Little black Leeches began squeezing through
at first it was only one Leech or two

The Craftsman was able to squish them all out
but even he grew tired bout after bout

They began to stick to his precious creation
Leeches worthy of the vilest waste-bin

The evil pulled petals off of wooden flowers
and the nose off of many clay tigers sin powers

Duly distraught for days he sat
tormented watching his statue crumble flat

Under the weight he watched stone clueless
wondering who endeavored to do this

Disregarding he set to his one task
deep within his mind he firmly did ask

He built a statuette and endowed it with life
by breathily bestowing will to battle strong strife

Using only dirt that had flowed into home
he crafted brains limbs and torso and left them alone

The Craftsman thought and pulled out a rib
and crafted the partner the woman most glib

The Craftsman sat back and watched ambition grow
the seeds thrived and they the **

They fought and they loved they created and destroyed
they lived and they died but survived all the void

The combat with Leeches
embattled stony beaches

Watching the battle
he saw no major rattle

When the Craftsman realized he was needed no longer
he built a chair for himself and sat down to ponder

Years and years more was the Craftsman
stoically sitting watching his creations gain traction

They leaped and progressed
with clothes or undressed

Intervening no more
they handled their score

His beard grew longer and longer and his eyes drooped lower and lower
until finally the Craftsman's heart beat slower and slower

comatose he waited ever in slumber
for his creations to need him to save any blunder

Ever hoping it never was necessary
life flowed around purposefully predatory

He watched their lineage improve naturally and viciously
and off they went history to history
the future was as it will be just a mystery

On a green leaf
For frogs
Illuminated by the surface under
There she sits on
A part
A piece I looked as a picture
Dazing wondrously and scouring with pairs
My sandals my feet my hands
All my fingers and nails
My ears
My toes of ten
and legs
Knees and my shoulders
The missing piece
or so i thought under
The afterthought
Full of doubters
For the plants grew all tall
None could be any taller
Dazzling danglers
A field under the stars.

Girly willed as am I
Which could not seem possible
Acceptance aches
Belief breaks
Even the words I speak, write or sing,
(Shall I
Hear it...)
over there it only echos
against the busy chatter and travels back home
Clogs *******
Reminding me that a life can be extinguished with mere
disbelief.
Disbelief and ignorance another pair...
Girly willed as I am
Nodding behind books
Fiction, fiction, fiction
They neigh
So here I go...
Thankful prayer as it did happen to us..
And all of it did
That it was I who did it.

Fuels of her pair
by flying passion and wild innocence
Now...
A human being
Limitless like the others
Why don't they not see? The rest, the stops,
The same scene, there is exactly the same scene...of falls.
If they just went out and did it, for a stretch and a walk,
Just grow out of leaves, be the branches printed of feathery crease
Because I am girly willed
Golden meadows lost to become treasure.
Fearless of rags she is as I am,
Laying afloat of the clouds, linen skies, seas and drifting through the weightless sand
Fearless forever.

Afloat I am,
The blind horizon spreads to no end.
O river of rivers,
The queen river,
Flow as you wish,
Gather silt forever
That on your shores
Men may harrow, then sow
The seeds of happiness
And sorrow to grow.


Afloat I am,
The blind horizon spreads to no end,
Hilsa leaps at the moon,
How wondrously they blend!

Hilsa leaps at the moon,
How wondrously they blend!
O river of rivers,
The starry river,
Your blinking waves drum
Of Behula's shiver.
I too am lost,
The tattered merchant fool,
My peacock barge rides
Fate's whirlpool.

Hilsa leaps at the moon,
How wondrously they blend!
When the whistling wind wakes
All courage is pretend.

When the whistling wind wakes
All courage is pretend,
O river of rivers,
The wise river.
Who would speak for us?
If not you, may be never.
Yet the mountains rise
From the hearths' ash,
You are silent, while
The history is brash.

When the whistling wind wakes
All courage is pretend.
Heaven's horn blares slender silver
For whom to comprehend?

Heaven's horn blares slender silver
For whom to comprehend?
O river of rivers,
The hungry river,
The consort of Ruin.
An arrow in Falguni's quiver.
The infinite wasteland beckons
Hold onto heart's dream,
One more sun above
Anguish and scream.

Heaven's horn blares slender silver
For whom to comprehend?
Afloat I am,
The blind horizon spreads to no end.

I would like to be
like glass
Beautifully touched
with a searing kiss, and
Wondrously shaped
into what
I could be

but there is also
A strange splendour
in the salt
That was the ocean,
kissed too hard by the Sun

and what about
The tide that always comes back
to kiss the shore
No matter how far
they separate?

I'm not sure if it's
beautiful, or pitiful
For the tide seems to
love the shore so much –
But what about the shore?
does it wish, with all its being,
That it could be with
the tide forever?

Or does it long
for those moments of peace
Without the tide
(to be alone?)

But
the tide
Always
comes back

Let's not forget about the Sun:
does it wish to come down and play
Or does it wish that
they would take their problems
And go away?

Those sometimes
    those moments of time….
I’ve Had My Times.      

        I’ve had my times….
times of feeling loss, pain, hurt
   times of wanting to run, to leave
   to go far away where nobody knows me…
   there was a time when i was carefree, loving life
   and in one moment,
                      in one little moment, it was gone.
i’ve been beaten down, i’ve had my innocents ripped away
     [fifteen-year abusive marriage]       [***** at sixteen]
i’ve cried a river or maybe it’s been an ocean of tears….
           [pain consumed my life for many years]
i’ve felt the hand of death too many times
my soul has bled, my heart….. has known much pain
    i’ve looked through windows of dark blue
seen streaks of red…
                               pondered black holes…
                  have had days of staying in bed…  
sometimes i’ve wanted the world to just go
                                                         leave me behind
let me be, let me die….

BUT……  
I’ve had those moments of time when….
    
                               i’ve held new life in my hands
heard the beauty of a newborns cry
       i’ve seen the beauty of an ocean sunset
gazed wondrously at sea spirits’ dancing on the water
i’ve breathed deeply in the fresh mountain air
          felt the softness of a breeze
                like gentle fingers moving through my hair
           i’ve seen the old find new love
                  an amazing magical sight to see…
i’ve watched my children build beautiful lives
      not always perfect but, full of hopes and dreams.
i’ve learned to give through my pain
   i’ve seen and felt passion
            i’ve walked through fire
               and found true beauty on the other side.
   i look for beauty every day, even when it’s hard to do
i let love flow to every part me
                                                 giving the best to you.
  i let it consume me because falling into the depths
     of the demons of my past, would destroy
that part of my soul i have fought so hard to get back
to keep, so i let love, passion, and beauty consume me.
   And I Forever Will…..
                                          ~
              A sweet release we give our heart
                from pain of past that tore apart,
                    relief that only one can find
         when hearts we let, become unconfined
             to leave behind those stormy skies
                      letting self-love baptize…
                                         ~

Vanilla vowels
and creamy colored consonants

Naughty or nutty nouns
of almonds, apples, apricots

Aphrodisiac adjectives
and very berry adverbs

Passion fruit  phrases
pirouette like peaches in thought

A pomegranate patter
that pronounces a pronoun

Or perhaps in veiled vines
velvet verbs purr

Wondrously whipped
words of love

Salacious sentences  
with strawberry stirred

A mellowed musk melon
of a metaphor

A salubrious simile
sits like a sapote crown

Amorous alliterative adventures  
with romance and raisins

An ooh la la of orange oomph
onomatopoeic sounds

An orchard of the alphabets
in a fruity potpourri of speech

A bearish pearish play and
plum pun on words

The language of love
written with love

In this hash mash
bonhomie
Valentine verse

Restoration

I found myself in a desert the sun beat down relentlessly you see I was just one more fool living on the
Devil’s life plan he comes and sizes you up watches with intensity not of care but hate he doesn’t take
Long he has seen the same thing multiplied many times before he does a little razz and dazzle if you
Could have seen my face you would know how appealing it was oh that’s right you got the same
Treatment you see this desert is where he houses all of his captives it’s so wide and vast the thought is
Who’s trapped but we are like the icy ice berg but with us it’s the conscious like the tip then the
Subconscious is all that mass the true awe and power of being human I want to insert two pieces I wrote
That deals with the subconscious I believe you will benefit from them just one more person’s thoughts
On Such a grand subject
Piercing the Inner Sanctum
The trivial the less important will never even get a start into the bastion of peace and well being that is
Sacred and defended to the last breath the one irresistible caller that is never barred and who is as a
Master key is beauty to no avail can you post guards loveliness has no comparisons like spectacle in any
And all forms it governs and rules all of our hearts once seen the invitation is never with drawn like the
Vistas seen from a high mountain incomparable glory is touched sequestered in depths of appreciation
Moments of grandeur with this spell compression is ultimate the thick richness slowly sinks beyond all
Comprehension it will linger for a life time the blues are the high honor of dress befitting a person of
Rare quality to have and squander cherished gifts the emptiness can never be measured but to make
Contact with the sublime on a desert plane the one invaluable gift of solitude no pretense or frivolity
To cause error or a missed chance to speak and hear wonders undeniable voice that is attended by rare
Essences of tranquility that robes itself in splendor it beckons in pure language simplicity that astounds
Bewilderment of the highest order lodges in your soul the hush of holy beings are noticed if only by the
Assured peace that builds a walled fortress nothing can assail these attainments visited and began
By The unutterable beauty that moves with conscious and deliberate design to bestow upon you
The Perfection that once ruled in Eden

Now deeper the mind seeks to find the way where all rules are absent

Bedazzled Dreamer
Put the long boat in the deep waters of the mind the calm peaceful knowing all is glowing we glide not
Knowing where were going the subconscious will be our guide dividing the two worlds the quiet
Submersible is wild anything may be floating in these depths we have left shore far behind truly
We have entered unchartered waters there is no fixable Bering a lustiness takes over there is no helm
Just a pervading looseness not unsettling but truly uncharacteristic for the coconscious must always
Have a grip a grasp of what is where it is and every detail must be quantified now all senses are blown
A storm is brewing its far reaches unknown but there is softness that excludes fear the overriding
Thought is possibilities can be forged maximized eternalized thoughts are ghost like unknown entities
They were formally known but now remain a mystery dislodged from thought bases that are not solid
All is free association tantalizing in one sense then disconcerting in another what do I do with my mind
Surly it has jumped off the track I could be bewildered if I could get a hold on the situation free flowing
Unspoken but still distinctively saying volumes where is the slow button reams voluminous thoughts
Are spewing into nothingness being lost I can’t keep up the discernible is mixed with eons and theorems
Time and space is void of meaning the world here is elastic mass it convulses at will no parameters exist
The only thing constant is high velocity change being in one place is impossible all is jumbled who stirred
This caldron in my mind voice and pure thought are the same think it know it what burdensome lives we
Live when it is all a tattered sail on rough seas we behold nothing know nothing in the extreme
Romanticism blurts out sail for Trafalgar we are strangers in a plush gifted void try as we will there is
No simple answers but we are a simple people truly the only time were are fit is when we are
Sound Asleep well then sleep on and I will do the same dreaming is therapeutic just think how
Crazy we would be without it

So with that small insight this is more truth I signed my life away to the devil and here is the fun
Part it’s like your hardly comfortable on a computer your on this small frame here he is on a
Worldwide super computer and he is a **** like no other you are slowly crawling along he is
Miles Ahead of you try to strike order in life this answer comes back it has been high jacked its
Not even your thoughts any more it’s completely contrary to all that is decent and ideal but it
Comes as a fog it creates a state of disinformation this is how we find we are bound in half truths
In this state how far from love how desperate is our circumstances what caused and allowed
Us to be left to the dry treacherous land of being forgotten misplaced without remedy to know the dark
Embrace of loneliness we are a people of language it finds us it speaks health to our inward being it is
The gentle soothing the spell that alone provides the structure the melodious times hear the flow of
Refreshing water from hidden springs they bend at just the right place they find us where dark
Broodings Are pulling us into compromise and ruin we feel and taste the surety of joy the call of
Assuredness is known in these depths this internal dismay of mazes infernal are their crushing blows
Does it wash away the meaningful is the face of grace seen to be drowning in walled in terrain to high to
Climb to understanding that enlightening that is our very humanness our ability to connect to share
Never forgetting who and where we came from the integral foundation that builds us as a people was
This first dislodging the first steps of chaos the hardness that drives and separates to quickly we are
Adrift and at the stern is ego without measure and the seeds of discontent are what we are sowing not
The creative roots of harmony and good will burned black by the desert sun all descriptors fail to show
The unique the part that truly was wondrously made no one is looking they are only into the new
Exciting theses very words are the quiet assault that is aimed at them they need restored but they never
Will agree then a nanny kills two little ones in her charge stabs them to death with this insane step into
Yet deeper subterranean darkness the roots of life are growing but they are poisoned throughout it
Reflects on the service the body is racked twisted as a gnarled old tree that can look picture perfect in
Nature but terrible in human life in this state of waste and need of restoration I could hardly see who
Cares at that point the view is most disgusting and in this condition all hope lost the final boat has sailed
With it the last of human dignity goes under the deep black waves when this thought was strongest the
Sea was not my reality only the lifeless desert it was all there was but all of a sudden was it mind tricks a
Mirage I was seeing this beautiful bough filled with blossoms and from there it continued to grow and
Spread out before me all green grasses a profusion of glorious colored flowers of all kinds it started to
Break through the deadness of my mind a time long forgotten slowly started to emerge I couldn’t see
Anyone but I knew that a visitor had joined me tears started like a dam had broken somewhere deep
Within all I knew I was truly loved I had worth and value I could feel it being added anew where I was
An eye sore just moments before now I was a princely person I had this intense sense of whoever it was
Who joined me had known extreme suffering He got me on every level and he was repairing and
Restoring those long festering wounds they just seem to fall off and the greatest peace started to emit
From my inner being there was just a sense of well being that was mountainous and truly rivers of joy
Started to flow out and away my friends step into these words they come from the great restorer your the gift that the thief stole and now you have been reclaimed

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin' in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may **** me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

i like seeing people when they're sleepy.
completely real
unfiltered humans,
yawning in their baggy nightclothes,
worn blankets wrapped like shawls,
and soft smiles
as they claim they aren't exhausted,
no,
their eyes are just tired.
their low mumbling gives them away every time, though.

people are wondrously beautiful in a
natural, peaceful state.

born 1900
when Austria was still a monarchy
    that did not know
    it was approaching its end

growing up as the daughter
of the mayor of a little district town
    big fish in a small pond
educated accordingly
as a ‘higher daughter’

   be a home decorator
   do needlework
   be a gourmet cook
   play the piano
   be a respectable member
       of the community and the parish

when she turned 18
after the end of world war I
the social order for which she had been prepared
simply disappeared

her father became a disillusioned monarchist
the town’s republicans elected a new mayor

she married a railway engineer
who left her after her daughter
    my mother
was born
she managed to survive world war II
as a single mother

watched her daughter
    fall in love with, at Christmas 1946,
    and marry in April 1947
a guy who had just escaped
from a Soviet POW camp
looked like a walking skeleton
       my father
AND
was the son of a communist
who  had survived  world war I
as a POW in Siberia

strange bedfellows

     they used to play cards together
     once a week
     with great gusto

     class warfare
     morphed into social entertainment

both my parents were working
grandmother  led the household
on the side did bookkeeping for local businesses
     to bring in some money
practically raised me and my brother
cared for us when we were sick
taught me to play the piano

was always afraid we would not get
enough to eat

for a while, as a little child,
I slept in the same room with her
and  learned that she had
a wondrously melodious snore
    going over an octave & some such

when, after grade school,
I had to leave at 5.45 am
to catch the train
    pulled by a sturdy steam engine
that took me to the high school  
    50km down the road
she was concerned when I
   rushing out the door
just grabbed parts of the breakfast
she had so lovingly prepared

when I left home for university
she was not happy
when I went to the USA for a whole year
she was disconsolate

she did enjoy her great-grandkids
when they visited, though

too much distance for too long
from the place of her birth
made her uncomfortable
in her later years
she needed a familiar place
that came with its familiar things
to do and know

she lived to be 87

I saw her last
after a second stroke
had mostly incapacitated her

a tiny woman
curled up
waiting to leave us
for a world that finally might heal
the pain and disappointment
she had so bravely mastered
throughout her life

His hand twisted the two wires,
          and the engine wondrously fired.

I yelled and cried when I broke my arm
          he easily wrapped it without alarm.

Sorry son, I can’t come to your game,
          the overtime list had my name.

Boy, there’s gonna be a delay,
          my big project is due today.

Your dad went out of town to speak,
          can’t play pitch and catch this week.

He picked up the phone and he heard me say:
          “Daddy, the cops wanna take me away.”

Tonight your dad’ll deposit his check
          then we can fix the car you wrecked.
                              ---------------
Thank you Daddy for all you’ve done
“Don’t thank me, your mama raised you, son.“

I regularly tear up with both sadness and joy
              seeing a daddy squatting, listening to his boy.

Father-son ties
mix long lows and splendid highs.
Yes, there are tears and yearning
for more than his earnings.
But now I see how my dad’s hand
protected and provided,
how he taught me to take a stand,
and showed me how to be a man.

Restoration

I found myself in a desert the sun beat down relentlessly you see I was just one more fool living on the
Devil’s life plan he comes and sizes you up watches with intensity not of care but hate he doesn’t take
Long he has seen the same thing multiplied many times before he does a little razz and dazzle if you
Could have seen my face you would know how appealing it was oh that’s right you got the same
Treatment you see this desert is where he houses all of his captives it’s so wide and vast the thought is
Who’s trapped but we are like the icy ice berg but with us it’s the conscious like the tip then the
Subconscious is all that mass the true awe and power of being human I want to insert two pieces I wrote
That deals with the subconscious I believe you will benefit from them just one more person’s thoughts
On Such a grand subject
Piercing the Inner Sanctum
The trivial the less important will never even get a start into the bastion of peace and well being that is
Sacred and defended to the last breath the one irresistible caller that is never barred and who is as a
Master key is beauty to no avail can you post guards loveliness has no comparisons like spectacle in any
And all forms it governs and rules all of our hearts once seen the invitation is never with drawn like the
Vistas seen from a high mountain incomparable glory is touched sequestered in depths of appreciation
Moments of grandeur with this spell compression is ultimate the thick richness slowly sinks beyond all
Comprehension it will linger for a life time the blues are the high honor of dress befitting a person of
Rare quality to have and squander cherished gifts the emptiness can never be measured but to make
Contact with the sublime on a desert plane the one invaluable gift of solitude no pretense or frivolity
To cause error or a missed chance to speak and hear wonders undeniable voice that is attended by rare
Essences of tranquility that robes itself in splendor it beckons in pure language simplicity that astounds
Bewilderment of the highest order lodges in your soul the hush of holy beings are noticed if only by the
Assured peace that builds a walled fortress nothing can assail these attainments visited and began
By The unutterable beauty that moves with conscious and deliberate design to bestow upon you
The Perfection that once ruled in Eden

Now deeper the mind seeks to find the way where all rules are absent

Bedazzled Dreamer
Put the long boat in the deep waters of the mind the calm peaceful knowing all is glowing we glide not
Knowing where were going the subconscious will be our guide dividing the two worlds the quiet
Submersible is wild anything may be floating in these depths we have left shore far behind truly
We have entered unchartered waters there is no fixable Bering a lustiness takes over there is no helm
Just a pervading looseness not unsettling but truly uncharacteristic for the coconscious must always
Have a grip a grasp of what is where it is and every detail must be quantified now all senses are blown
A storm is brewing its far reaches unknown but there is softness that excludes fear the overriding
Thought is possibilities can be forged maximized eternalized thoughts are ghost like unknown entities
They were formally known but now remain a mystery dislodged from thought bases that are not solid
All is free association tantalizing in one sense then disconcerting in another what do I do with my mind
Surly it has jumped off the track I could be bewildered if I could get a hold on the situation free flowing
Unspoken but still distinctively saying volumes where is the slow button reams voluminous thoughts
Are spewing into nothingness being lost I can’t keep up the discernible is mixed with eons and theorems
Time and space is void of meaning the world here is elastic mass it convulses at will no parameters exist
The only thing constant is high velocity change being in one place is impossible all is jumbled who stirred
This caldron in my mind voice and pure thought are the same think it know it what burdensome lives we
Live when it is all a tattered sail on rough seas we behold nothing know nothing in the extreme
Romanticism blurts out sail for Trafalgar we are strangers in a plush gifted void try as we will there is
No simple answers but we are a simple people truly the only time were are fit is when we are
Sound Asleep well then sleep on and I will do the same dreaming is therapeutic just think how
Crazy we would be without it

So with that small insight this is more truth I signed my life away to the devil and here is the fun
Part it’s like your hardly comfortable on a computer your on this small frame here he is on a
Worldwide super computer and he is a **** like no other you are slowly crawling along he is
Miles Ahead of you try to strike order in life this answer comes back it has been high jacked its
Not even your thoughts any more it’s completely contrary to all that is decent and ideal but it
Comes as a fog it creates a state of disinformation this is how we find we are bound in half truths
In this state how far from love how desperate is our circumstances what caused and allowed
Us to be left to the dry treacherous land of being forgotten misplaced without remedy to know the dark
Embrace of loneliness we are a people of language it finds us it speaks health to our inward being it is
The gentle soothing the spell that alone provides the structure the melodious times hear the flow of
Refreshing water from hidden springs they bend at just the right place they find us where dark
Broodings Are pulling us into compromise and ruin we feel and taste the surety of joy the call of
Assuredness is known in these depths this internal dismay of mazes infernal are their crushing blows
Does it wash away the meaningful is the face of grace seen to be drowning in walled in terrain to high to
Climb to understanding that enlightening that is our very humanness our ability to connect to share
Never forgetting who and where we came from the integral foundation that builds us as a people was
This first dislodging the first steps of chaos the hardness that drives and separates to quickly we are
Adrift and at the stern is ego without measure and the seeds of discontent are what we are sowing not
The creative roots of harmony and good will burned black by the desert sun all descriptors fail to show
The unique the part that truly was wondrously made no one is looking they are only into the new
Exciting theses very words are the quiet assault that is aimed at them they need restored but they never
Will agree then a nanny kills two little ones in her charge stabs them to death with this insane step into
Yet deeper subterranean darkness the roots of life are growing but they are poisoned throughout it
Reflects on the service the body is racked twisted as a gnarled old tree that can look picture perfect in
Nature but terrible in human life in this state of waste and need of restoration I could hardly see who
Cares at that point the view is most disgusting and in this condition all hope lost the final boat has sailed
With it the last of human dignity goes under the deep black waves when this thought was strongest the
Sea was not my reality only the lifeless desert it was all there was but all of a sudden was it mind tricks a
Mirage I was seeing this beautiful bough filled with blossoms and from there it continued to grow and
Spread out before me all green grasses a profusion of glorious colored flowers of all kinds it started to
Break through the deadness of my mind a time long forgotten slowly started to emerge I couldn’t see
Anyone but I knew that a visitor had joined me tears started like a dam had broken somewhere deep
Within all I knew I was truly loved I had worth and value I could feel it being added anew where I was
An eye sore just moments before now I was a princely person I had this intense sense of whoever it was
Who joined me had known extreme suffering He got me on every level and he was repairing and
Restoring those long festering wounds they just seem to fall off and the greatest peace started to emit
From my inner being there was just a sense of well being that was mountainous and truly rivers of joy
Started to flow out and away my friends step into these words they come from the great restorer your the gift that the thief stole and now you have been reclaimed

Some moments I stop and think:
I'd give in to it, just to give myself purpose.
I ponder a ******'s destiny and it hurts wondrously,
Like a super-massive black-hole.
I want to dive in and lose control.
How long until I get bored, curious?

What are those depths like, how will it be
at rock-bottom, lying on my back
looking to the sky?

Tell me I'm wrong,
That my venturous nature will not
be the death of me.
At a point in time I questioned (with) my life,
You can't start living
until you've made a conscious decision not to die.
So, why choose life?

Hah, I dunno.
Were you really expecting grand answers
from a teenage ******-to-be?
"Who's the more foolish,
The fool
or the fool who follows him?"
Come find yourself, then
we'll see who's laughing.

"I want to taste the literature
Within you
Let me show you how to be free...
Your mind is the most beautiful combination of
McEwan sprinkled with a little Palahniuk, throw in some James
It is **** to me the way your feet stay on the ground,
No matter how high they lift you up.
Sometimes I watch you while you read
And I wonder what could possibly be
Slayed across that page so wondrously
As to grant the room with the parting
Of your lips..."

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin' in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may **** me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise. By maya angelou

Time stopped. I had no bearing as to who, where, or what I was. All that was in my presence was the high, rolling desert painted orange with that odd sand-mud that he called “Geonosian rock;” his ebbing backpack being pulled from his shoulder, just like the ocean tide; his canteen bottle, lidless, slipping out of the rear pocket and whetting the sand with the boy’s quickly diminishing water supply; and the boy, Davy, being torn helplessly from safety by the cool, malevolent hands of gravity, and into the crevasse.
Reaching out desperately for the boy’s damp, warm hands, I grab a hold just in time—to consciousness, as he plummets and I stare wondrously; dumbfounded by my own ineptness in rational thinking. the boy is gone. Davy, my own stepson, my ******* child whom I would do anything for to prove my worth to his mother, Mary, who was the token to happiness with a new family, was ripped from my grasp, and eaten by the New Mexican terrain. So I delved after him.

I found myself in a desert the sun beat down relentlessly you see I was just one more fool living on the
Devil’s life plan he comes and sizes you up watches with intensity not of care but hate he doesn’t take
Long he has seen the same thing multiplied many times before he does a little razz and dazzle if you
Could have seen my face you would know how appealing it was oh that’s right you got the same
Treatment you see this desert is where he houses all of his captives it’s so wide and vast the thought is
Who’s trapped but we are like the icy ice berg but with us it’s the conscious like the tip then the
Subconscious is all that mass the true awe and power of being human I want to insert two pieces I wrote
That deals with the subconscious I believe you will benefit from them just one more person’s thoughts
On Such a grand subject
Piercing the Inner Sanctum
The trivial the less important will never even get a start into the bastion of peace and well being that is
Sacred and defended to the last breath the one irresistible caller that is never barred and who is as a
Master key is beauty to no avail can you post guards loveliness has no comparisons like spectacle in any
And all forms it governs and rules all of our hearts once seen the invitation is never with drawn like the
Vistas seen from a high mountain incomparable glory is touched sequestered in depths of appreciation
Moments of grandeur with this spell compression is ultimate the thick richness slowly sinks beyond all
Comprehension it will linger for a life time the blues are the high honor of dress befitting a person of
Rare quality to have and squander cherished gifts the emptiness can never be measured but to make
Contact with the sublime on a desert plane the one invaluable gift of solitude no pretense or frivolity
To cause error or a missed chance to speak and hear wonders undeniable voice that is attended by rare
Essences of tranquility that robes itself in splendor it beckons in pure language simplicity that astounds
Bewilderment of the highest order lodges in your soul the hush of holy beings are noticed if only by the
Assured peace that builds a walled fortress nothing can assail these attainments visited and began
By The unutterable beauty that moves with conscious and deliberate design to bestow upon you
The Perfection that once ruled in Eden

Now deeper the mind seeks to find the way where all rules are absent

Bedazzled Dreamer
Put the long boat in the deep waters of the mind the calm peaceful knowing all is glowing we glide not
Knowing where were going the subconscious will be our guide dividing the two worlds the quiet
Submersible is wild anything may be floating in these depths we have left shore far behind truly
We have entered unchartered waters there is no fixable Bering a lustiness takes over there is no helm
Just a pervading looseness not unsettling but truly uncharacteristic for the coconscious must always
Have a grip a grasp of what is where it is and every detail must be quantified now all senses are blown
A storm is brewing its far reaches unknown but there is softness that excludes fear the overriding
Thought is possibilities can be forged maximized eternalized thoughts are ghost like unknown entities
They were formally known but now remain a mystery dislodged from thought bases that are not solid
All is free association tantalizing in one sense then disconcerting in another what do I do with my mind
Surly it has jumped off the track I could be bewildered if I could get a hold on the situation free flowing
Unspoken but still distinctively saying volumes where is the slow button reams voluminous thoughts
Are spewing into nothingness being lost I can’t keep up the discernible is mixed with eons and theorems
Time and space is void of meaning the world here is elastic mass it convulses at will no parameters exist
The only thing constant is high velocity change being in one place is impossible all is jumbled who stirred
This caldron in my mind voice and pure thought are the same think it know it what burdensome lives we
Live when it is all a tattered sail on rough seas we behold nothing know nothing in the extreme
Romanticism blurts out sail for Trafalgar we are strangers in a plush gifted void try as we will there is
No simple answers but we are a simple people truly the only time were are fit is when we are
Sound Asleep well then sleep on and I will do the same dreaming is therapeutic just think how
Crazy we would be without it

So with that small insight this is more truth I signed my life away to the devil and here is the fun
Part it’s like your hardly comfortable on a computer your on this small frame here he is on a
Worldwide super computer and he is a **** like no other you are slowly crawling along he is  
Miles Ahead of you try to strike order in life this answer comes back it has been high jacked its
Not even your thoughts any more it’s completely contrary to all that is decent and ideal but it
Comes as a fog it creates a state of disinformation this is how we find we are bound in half truths  
In this state how far from love how desperate is our circumstances what caused and allowed
Us to be left to the dry treacherous land of being forgotten misplaced without remedy to know the dark
Embrace of loneliness we are a people of language it finds us it speaks health to our inward being it is
The gentle soothing the spell that alone provides the structure the melodious times hear the flow of
Refreshing water from hidden springs they bend at just the right place they find us where dark
Broodings Are pulling us into compromise and ruin we feel and taste the surety of joy the call of
Assuredness is known in these depths this internal dismay of mazes infernal are their crushing blows
Does it wash away the meaningful is the face of grace seen to be drowning in walled in terrain to high to
Climb to understanding that enlightening that is our very humanness our ability to connect to share
Never forgetting who and where we came from the integral foundation that builds us as a people was
This first dislodging the first steps of chaos the hardness that drives and separates to quickly we are
Adrift and at the stern is ego without measure and the seeds of discontent are what we are sowing not
The creative roots of harmony and good will burned black by the desert sun all descriptors fail to show
The unique the part that truly was wondrously made no one is looking they are only into the new
Exciting theses very words are the quiet assault that is aimed at them they need restored but they never
Will agree then a nanny kills two little ones in her charge stabs them to death with this insane step into
Yet deeper subterranean darkness the roots of life are growing but they are poisoned throughout it
Reflects on the service the body is racked twisted as a gnarled old tree that can look picture perfect in
Nature but terrible in human life in this state of waste and need of restoration I could hardly see who
Cares at that point the view is most disgusting and in this condition all hope lost the final boat has sailed
With it the last of human dignity goes under the deep black waves when this thought was strongest the
Sea was not my reality only the lifeless desert it was all there was but all of a sudden was it mind tricks a
Mirage I was seeing this beautiful bough filled with blossoms and from there it continued to grow and
Spread out before me all green grasses a profusion of glorious colored flowers of all kinds it started to
Break through the deadness of my mind a time long forgotten slowly started to emerge I couldn’t see
Anyone but I knew that a visitor had joined me tears started like a dam had broken somewhere deep
With in all I knew I was truly loved I had worth and value I could feel it being added anew where I was
An eye sore just moments before now I was a princely person I had this intense sense of whoever it was
Who joined me had known extreme suffering He got me on every level and he was repairing and
Restoring those long festering wounds they just seem to fall off and the greatest peace started to emit
From my inner being there was just a sense of well being that was mountainous and truly rivers of joy
Started to flow out and away my friends step into these words they come from the great restorer your the gift that the thief stole and now you have been reclaimed

Prose Poems and Experimental Poems
by Michael R. Burch

These are prose poems (is that an oxymoron?)  and experimental poems that begin with the first non-rhyming poem I wrote as a teenager...



Something
―for the children of the Holocaust and the Nakba
by Michael R. Burch

Something inescapable is lost―lost like a pale vapor curling up into shafts of moonlight, vanishing in a gust of wind toward an expanse of stars immeasurable and void. Something uncapturable is gone―gone with the spent leaves and illuminations of autumn, scattered into a haze with the faint rustle of parched grass and remembrance. Something unforgettable is past―blown from a glimmer into nothingness, or less, which finality swept into a corner, where it lies... in dust and cobwebs and silence.

This was my first poem that didn't rhyme, written in my late teens. The poem came to me 'from blue nothing' (to borrow a phrase from my friend the Maltese poet Joe Ruggier) . Years later, I dedicated the poem to the children of the Holocaust and the Nakba.


briefling
by Michael R. Burch

manishatched, hopsintotheMix, cavorts, hassex (quick! , spawnanewBrood!) ; then, likeamayfly, he's suddenly gone: plantfood.



It's Hard Not To Be Optimistic: An Updated Sonnet to Science
by Michael R. Burch

"DNA has cured deadly diseases and allowed labs to create animals with fantastic new features." ― U.S. News & World Report

It's hard not to be optimistic when things are so wondrously futuristic: when DNA, our new Louie Pasteur, can effect an autonomous, miraculous cure, while labs churn out fluorescent monkeys who, with infinite typewriters, might soon outdo USN&WR's flunkeys. Yes, it's hard not to be optimistic when the world is so delightfully pluralistic: when Schrödinger's cat is both dead and alive, and Hawking says time can run backwards. We thrive, befuddled drones, on someone else's regurgitated nectar, while our cheers drown out poet-alarmists who might Hector the Achilles heel of pure science (common sense)  and reporters who tap out supersillyous nonsense. [Dear U.S. News & World Report Editors: I am a fan of both real science and science fiction, and I like to think I can tell the difference, at least between the two extremes. I feel confident that Schrödinger didn't think the cat in his famous experiment was both dead and alive. Rather, he was pointing out that we can't know until we open the box, scratchings and smell aside. While traveling backwards in time is great for science fiction, it seems extremely doubtful as a practical application. And as for DNA curing deadly diseases... well, it must have created them, so perhaps don't give it too much credit! While I'm usually a fan of your magazine, as a writer I must take to task the Frankensteinian logic of the excerpt I cited, and I challenge you to publish my "letter" as proof that poets do have a function in the third millennium, even if it is only to suggest that paid writers should not create such outlandish, freakish horrors of the English language.―Somewhat irked, but still a fan, Michael R. Burch]



bachelorhoodwinked
by Michael R. Burch

u are charming & disarming, but mostly! ! ! ALARMING! ! ! since all my resolve dissolved! u are chic as a sheikh's harem girl in the sheets, but now my bed's not my own and my kingdom's been overthrown!



Starting from Scratch with Ol' Scratch
by Michael R. Burch

for the Religious Right

Love, with a small, fatalistic sigh went to the ovens. Please don't bother to cry. You could have saved her, but you were all *******: complaining about the Jews to Reichmeister Grupp. Scratch that. You were born after World War II. You had something more important to do: while the children of the Nakba were perishing in Gaza with the complicity of your government, you had a noble cause (a religious tract against homosexual marriage and various things gods and evangelists disparage.)  Jesus will grok you? Ah, yes, I'm quite sure that your intentions were good and ineluctably pure. After all, what the hell does he care about Palestinians? Certainly, Christians were right about serfs, slaves and Indians. Scratch that. You're one of the Devil's minions.



Prose Poem: The Trouble with Poets
by Michael R. Burch

This morning the neighborhood girls were helping their mothers with chores, but one odd little girl was out picking roses by herself, looking very small and lonely.

Suddenly the odd one refused to pick roses anymore because she decided it might "hurt" them. Now she just sits beside the bushes, rocking gently back and forth, weeping and consoling them!

Now she's lost all interest in nature, which she finds "appalling." She dresses in black "like Rilke" and says she prefers the "roses of the imagination"! She mumbles constantly about being "pricked in conscience" and being "pricked to death." What on earth can she mean? Does she plan to have *** until she dies?

For chrissake, now she's locked herself in her room and refuses to come out until she has "conjured" the "perfect rose of the imagination"! We haven't seen her for days. Her only communications are texts punctuated liberally with dashes. They appear to be badly-rhymed poems. She signs them "starving artist" in lower-case. What on earth can she mean? Is she anorexic, or bulimic, or is this just a phase she'll outgrow?



escape!
by michael r. burch

to live among the daffodil folk... slip down the rainslickened drainpipe... suddenly pop out the GARGANTUAN SPOUT... minuscule as alice, shout yippee-yi-yee! in wee exultant glee to be leaving behind the LARGE THREE-DENALI GARAGE.

escape! !

u are too beautiful, too innocent, too inherently lovely to merely reflect the sun's splendor... too full of irresistible candor to remain silent, too delicately fawnlike for a world so violent... come, my beautiful bambi and i will protect you... but of course u have already been lured away by the dew-laden roses...



Children's Prose Poem: The Three Sisters and the Mysteries of the Magical Pond
by Michael R. Burch

Every child has a secret name, which only their guardian angel knows. Fortunately, I am able to talk to angels, so I know the secret names of the Three Sisters who are the heroines of the story I am about to tell...

The secret names of the Three Sisters are Etheria, Sunflower and Bright Eyes. Etheria, because the eldest sister's hair shines like an ethereal blonde halo. Sunflower, because the middle sister loves to plait bright flowers into her hair. Bright Eyes, because the youngest sister has flashing dark eyes that are sometimes full of mischief! This is the story of how the Three Sisters solved the Three Mysteries of the Magical Pond...

The first mystery of the Magical Pond was the mystery of the Great Heron. Why did the Great Heron seem so distant and aloof, never letting human beings or even other animals come close to it? This great mystery was solved by Etheria, who noticed that the Great Heron was so large it couldn't fly away from danger quickly. So the Heron was not being aloof at all... it was simply being cautious and protecting itself by keeping its distance from faster creatures. Things are not always as they appear!

The second mystery was the mystery of the River Monster. What was the dreaded River Monster, and did it pose a danger to the three sisters and their loved ones? This great mystery was solved by Sunflower, who found the River Monster's footprints in the mud after a spring rain. Sunflower bravely followed the footprints to a bank of the pond, looked down, and to her surprise found a giant snapping turtle gazing back at her! Thus the mystery was solved, and the River Monster was not dangerous to little girls or their family and friends, because it was far too slow to catch them. But it could be dangerous if anyone was foolish enough to try to pet it. Sometimes it is best to leave nature's larger creatures alone, and not tempt fate, even when things are not always as they appear!

The third mystery was the most perplexing of all. How was it possible that tiny little starlings kept chasing away much larger crows, hawks and eagles? What a conundrum! (A conundrum is a perplexing problem that is very difficult to solve, such as the riddle: "What walks on four legs in the morning, on two legs during the day, then on three legs at night? " Can you solve it? ... The answer is a human being, who crawls on four legs as a baby, then walks on two legs most of its life, but needs a walking cane in old age. This is the famous Riddle of the Sphinx.)  Yes, what a conundrum! But fortunately Bright Eyes was able to solve the Riddle of the Starlings, because she noticed that the tiny birds were much more agile in the air, while the much larger hawks and eagles couldn't change direction as easily. So, while it seemed the starlings were risking their lives to defend their nests, in reality they had the advantage! Once again, things are not always as they appear!

Now, these are just three adventures of the Three Sisters, and there are many others. In fact, they will have a whole lifetime of adventures, and perhaps we can share in them from time to time. But if their mother reads them this story at bedtime, by the end of the story their eyes may be getting very sleepy, and they may soon have dreams of Giant Herons, and Giant Turtles, and Tiny Starlings chasing away Crows, Hawks and Eagles! Sweet dreams, Etheria, Sunflower and Bright Eyes!



Fake News, Probably
by Michael R. Burch

The elusive Orange-Tufted Fitz-Gibbon is the rarest of creatures―rarer by far than Sasquatch and the Abominable Snowman (although they are very similar in temperament and destructive capabilities) . While the common gibbon is not all that uncommon, the orange-tufted genus has been found less frequently in the fossil record than hobbits and unicorns. The Fitz-Gibbon sub-genus is all the more remarkable because it apparently believes itself to be human, and royalty, no less! Now there are rumors―admittedly hard to believe―that an Orange-Tufted Fitz-Gibbon resides in the White House and has been spotted playing with the nuclear codes while chattering incessantly about attacking China, Mexico, Iran and North Korea. We find it very hard to credit such reports. Surely American voters would not elect an oddly-colored ape with self-destructive tendencies president!



Writing Verse for Free, Versus Programs for a Fee
by Michael R. Burch

How is writing a program like writing a poem? You start with an idea, something fresh. Almost a wish. Something effervescent, like foam flailing itself against the rocks of a lost tropical coast...

After the idea, of course, there are complications and trepidations, as with the poem or even the foam. Who will see it, appreciate it, understand it? What will it do? Is it worth the effort, all the mad dashing and crashing about, the vortex―all that? And to what effect?

Next comes the real labor, the travail, the scouring hail of things that simply don't fit or make sense. Of course, with programming you have the density of users to fix, which is never a problem with poetry, since the users have already had their fix (this we know because they are still reading and think everything makes sense) ; but this is the only difference.

Anyway, what's left is the debugging, or, if you're a poet, the hugging yourself and crying, hoping someone will hear you, so that you can shame them into reading your poem, which they will refuse, but which your mother will do if you phone, perhaps with only the tiniest little mother-of-the-poet, harried, self-righteous moan.

The biggest difference between writing a program and writing a poem is simply this: if your program works, or seems to work, or almost works, or doesn't work at all, you're set and hugely overpaid. Made-in-the-shade-have-a-pink-lemonade-and-ticker-tape-parade OVERPAID.

If your poem is about your lover and ***** up quite nicely, perhaps you'll get laid. Perhaps. Regardless, you'll probably see someone repossessing your furniture and TV to bring them posthaste to someone like me. The moral is this: write programs first, then whatever passes for poetry. DO YOUR SHARE; HELP END POVERTY TODAY!



Prose Poem: Litany
by Michael R. Burch

Will you take me with all my blemishes? I will take you with all your blemishes, and show you mine. We'll **** wine out of cardboard boxes till our teeth and lips shine red like greedily gorging foxes'. We'll swill our fill, then have *** for hours till our neglected guts at last rebel. At two in the morning, we'll eat cold Krystals out of greasy cardboard boxes, and we will be in love. And that's it? That's it! And can I go out with my friends and drink until dawn? You can go out with your friends and drink until dawn, come home lipstick-collared, pass out by the pool, or stay at the bar till the new moon sets, because we will be in love, and in love there is no room for remorse or regret. There is no right, no wrong, and no mistrust, only limb-numbing ***, hot-pistoning lust. And that's all? That's all. That's great! But wait... Wait? Why? What's wrong? I want to have your children. Children? Well, perhaps just one. And what will happen when we have children? The most incredible things will happen―you'll change, stop acting so strangely, start paying more attention to me, start paying your bills on time, grow up and get rid of your horrible friends, and never come home at a-quarter-to-three drunk from a night of swilling, smelling like a lovesick skunk, stop acting so lewdly, start working incessantly so that we can afford a new house which I will decorate lavishly and then grow tired of in a year or two or three, start growing a paunch so that no other woman would ever have you, stop acting so boorishly, start growing a beard because you're too tired to shave, or too afraid, thinking you might slit your worthless wrinkled throat...



Sweet Nothings
by Michael R. Burch

Tonight, will you whisper me a sweet enchantment? We'll take my motorcycle, blaze a trail of metallic exhaust and scorched-black sulphuric fumes to a ****** diner where I'll slip my fingers under your yellow sun dress, inside the elastic waist band of your thin white cotton *******, till your pinkling lips moisten obligingly and the corpulent pink hot dog with tangy brown mustard and sweet pickle relish comes. Tonight, can we talk about something other than ***, perhaps things we both love? What I love is to go to the beach, where the hot oil smells like baking coconuts, and lie in the sun's humidor thinking of you, while the sand worms its way inside your **** little pink bikini, your compressed ******* squishy with warm sweet milk like coconuts, the hair between your legs sleek as a wet mink's... Tonight, can we make love instead of just talking *****? Sorry, honey, I'm just not in the mood.



Sometimes the Dead
by Michael R. Burch

Sometimes we catch them out of the corners of our eyes―the pale dead. After they have fled the gourds of their bodies, like escaping fragrances they rise. Once they have become a cloud's mist, sometimes like the rain they descend; ... they appear, sometimes silver, like laughter, to gladden the hearts of men. Sometimes like a pale gray fog, they drift unencumbered, yet lumbrously, as if over the sea there was the lightest vapor even Atlas could not lift. Sometimes they haunt our dreams like forgotten melodies only half-remembered. Though they lie dismembered in black catacombs, sepulchers and dismal graves; although they have committed felonies, yet they are us. Someday soon we will meet them in the graveyard dust, blood-engorged, but never sated since Cain slew Abel. But until we become them, let us steadfastly forget them, even as we know our children must...



Fascination with Light
by Michael R. Burch

Desire glides in on calico wings, a breath of a moth seeking a companionable light... where it hovers, unsure, sullen, shy or demure, in the margins of night, a soft blur. With a frantic dry rattle of alien wings, it rises and thrums one long breathless staccato... and flutters and drifts on in dark aimless flight. And yet it returns to the flame, its delight, as long as it burns.



Burn, Ovid
by Michael R. Burch

"Burn Ovid"―Austin Clarke

Sunday School, Faith Free Will Baptist,1973: I sat imaging watery folds of pale silk encircling her waist. Explicit *** was the day's "hot" topic (how breathlessly I imagined hers)  as she taught us the perils of lust fraught with inhibition. I found her unaccountably beautiful, as she rolled implausible nouns off the edge of her tongue: adultery, fornication, *******, ******. Acts made suddenly plausible by the faint blush of her unrouged cheeks, by her pale lips accented only by a slight quiver, a trepidation. What did those lustrous folds foretell of our uncommon desire? Why did she cross and uncross her legs lovely and long in their taupe sheaths? Why did her ******* rise pointedly, as if indicating a direction?

"Come unto me,
(unto me) , "
together, we sang,

cheek to breast,
lips on lips,
devout, afire,

my hands
up her skirt,
her pants at her knees:

all night long,
all night long,
in the heavenly choir.



*** 101
by Michael R. Burch

That day the late spring heat steamed through the windows of a Crayola-yellow schoolbus crawling its way up the backwards slopes of Nowheresville, North Carolina... Where we sat exhausted from the day's skulldrudgery and the unexpected waves of muggy, summer-like humidity... Giggly first graders sat two abreast behind senior high students sprouting their first sparse beards, their implausible bosoms, their stranger affections... The most unlikely coupling―Lambert,18, the only college prospect on the varsity basketball team, the proverbial talldarkhandsome swashbuckling cocksman, grinning... Beside him, Wanda,13, bespectacled, in her primproper attire and pigtails, staring up at him, fawneyed, disbelieving... And as the bus filled with the improbable musk of her, as she twitched impaled on his finger like a dead frog jarred to life by electrodes, I knew... that love is a forlorn enterprise, that I would never understand it.



Veiled
by Michael R. Burch

She has belief without comprehension, and in her crutchwork shack she is much like us... Tamping the bread into edible forms, regarding her children at play with something akin to relief... Ignoring the towers ablaze in the distance because they are not revelations but things of glass, easily shattered... Aand if you were to ask her, she might say―sometimes God visits his wrath upon an impious nation for its leaders' sins... And we might agree: seeing her mutilations.



Lucifer, to the Enola Gay
by Michael R. Burch

Go then, and give them my meaning, so that their teeming streets become my city. Bring back a pretty flower―a chrysanthemum, perhaps, to bloom, if but an hour, within a certain room of mine where the sun does not rise or fall, and the moon, although it is content to shine, helps nothing at all. There, if I hear the wistful call of their voices regretting choices made, or perhaps not made in time, I can look back upon it and recall―in all its pale forms sublime, still, Death will never be holy again.



The Evolution of Love
by Michael R. Burch

Love among the infinitesimal flotillas of amoebas is a dance of transient appendages, wild sails that gather in warm brine and then express one headstream as two small, divergent wakes. Minuscule voyage―love! Upon false feet, the pseudopods of uprightness, we creep toward self-immolation: two nee one. We cannot photosynthesize the sun, and so we love in darkness, till we come at last to understand: man's spineless heart is alien to any land. We part to single cells; we rise on buoyant tears, amoeba-light, to breathe new atmospheres... and still we sink. The night is full of stars we cannot grasp, though all the World is ours. Have we such cells within us, bent on love to ever-changingness, so that to part is not to be the same, or even one? Is love our evolution, or a scream against the thought of separateness―a cry of strangled recognition? Love, or die, or love and die a little. Hopeful death! Come scale these cliffs, lie changing, share this breath.



Longing
by Michael R. Burch

We stare out at the cold gray sea, overcome with such sudden and intense longing... our eyes meet, inviolate... and we are not of this earth, this strange, inert mass. Before we crept out of the shoals of the inchoate sea... before we grew the quaint appendages and orifices of love... before our jellylike nuclei, struggling to be hearts, leapt at the sight of that first bright, oracular sun, then watched it plummet, the birth and death of our illumination... before we wept... before we knew... before our unformed hearts grew numb, again, in the depths of the sea's indecipherable darkness... when we were only a swirling profusion of recombinant things wafting loose silt from the sea's soft floor, writhing and ******* in convulsive beds of mucousy foliage,

flowering,
flowering,
flowering...

what jolted us to life?



Memento Mori
by Michael R. Burch

I found among the elms
something like the sound of your voice,
something like the aftermath of love itself
after the lightning strikes,
when the startled wind shrieks...

a gored-out wound in wood,
love's pale memento mori―
that white scar
in that first heart,
forever unhealed...

and a burled, thick knot incised
with six initials pledged
against all possible futures,
and penknife-notched below,
six edged, chipped words
that once cut deep and said...

WILL U B MINE
4 EVER?

... which now, so disconsolately answer...

----------------N
-- EVER.



Nucleotidings
by Michael R. Burch

"We will walk taller! " said Gupta,
sorta abrupta,
hand-in-hand with his mom,
eyeing the A-bomb.

"Who needs a mahatma
in the aftermath of NAFTA?
Now, that was a disaster, "
cried glib Punjab.

"After Y2k,
time will spin out of control anyway, "
flamed Vijay.

"My family is relatively heavy,
too big even for a pig-barn Chevy;
we need more space, "
spat What's His Face.

"What does it matter,
dirge or mantra, "
sighed Serge.

"The world will wobble
in Hubble's lens
till the tempest ends, "
wailed Mercedes.

"The world is going to hell in a bucket.
So **** it and get outta my face!
We own this place!
Me and my friends got more guns than ISIS,
so what's the crisis? "
cried Bubba Billy Joe Bob Puckett.



They Take Their Shape
by Michael R. Burch

"We will not forget moments of silence and days of mourning..."―George W. Bush

We will not forget...
the moments of silence and the days of mourning,
the bells that swung from leaden-shadowed vents
to copper bursts above "hush! "-chastened children
who saw the sun break free (abandonment
to run and laugh forsaken for the moment) ,
still flashing grins they could not quite repent...
Nor should they―anguish triumphs just an instant;

this every child accepts; the nymphet weaves;
transformed, the grotesque adult-thing emerges:
damp-winged, huge-eyed, to find the sun deceives...
But children know; they spin limpwinged in darkness
cocooned in hope―the shriveled chrysalis

that paralyzes time. Suspended, dreaming,
they do not fall, but grow toward what is,
then ***** about to find which transformation
might best endure the light or dark. "Survive"
becomes the whispered mantra of a pupa's
awakening... till What takes shape and flies
shrieks, parroting Our own shrill, restive cries.



chrysalis
by Michael R. Burch

these are the days of doom
u seldom leave ur room
u live in perpetual gloom

yet also the days of hope
how to cope?
u pray and u *****

toward self illumination...
becoming an angel
(pure love)

and yet You must love Your Self

If you know someone who is very caring and loving, but struggles with self worth, this may be a poem to consider.

Keywords/Tags: prose poem, experimental, free verse, freedom, expression, silence, void, modern, modern psalm, Holocaust


To Have Loved
by Michael R. Burch

"The face that launched a thousand ships ..."

Helen, bright accompaniment,
accouterment of war as sure as all
the polished swords of princes groomed to lie
in mausoleums all eternity ...

The price of love is not so high
as never to have loved once in the dark
beyond foreseeing. Now, as dawn gleams pale
upon small wind-fanned waves, amid white sails, ...

now all that war entails becomes as small,
as though receding. Paris in your arms
was never yours, nor were you his at all.
And should gods call

in numberless strange voices, should you hear,
still what would be the difference? Men must die
to be remembered. Fame, the shrillest cry,
leaves all the world dismembered.

Hold him, lie,
tell many pleasant tales of lips and thighs;
enthrall him with your sweetness, till the pall
and ash lie cold upon him.

Is this all? You saw fear in his eyes, and now they dim
with fear’s remembrance. Love, the fiercest cry,
becomes gasped sighs in his once-gallant hymn
of dreamed “salvation.” Still, you do not care

because you have this moment, and no man
can touch you as he can ... and when he’s gone
there will be other men to look upon
your beauty, and have done.

Smile―woebegone, pale, haggard. Will the tales
paint this―your final portrait? Can the stars
find any strange alignments, Zodiacs,
to spell, or unspell, what held beauty lacks?

Published by The Raintown Review, Triplopia, The Electic Muse, The Chained Muse, The Pennsylvania Review, and in a YouTube recital by David B. Gosselin. This is, of course, a poem about the famous Helen of Troy, whose face "launched a thousand ships."
Keywords/Tags: Helen, Troy, Paris, love, war, gods, fate, destiny, portrait, fame, famous, stars, Zodiac, Zodiacs, star-crossed, spell, charm, potion, enchantment, Greece, Greek, mythology, legend, Homer, Odyssey, accompaniment, accouterment, eternal, eternity, immortal



EPIGRAM TRANSLATIONS BY MICHAEL R. BURCH



NOVELTIES
by Thomas Campion
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Booksellers laud authors for novel editions
as pimps praise their ****** for exotic positions.



Nod to the Master
by Michael R. Burch

for the Divine Oscar Wilde

If every witty thing that’s said were true,
Oscar Wilde, the world would worship You!



A question that sometimes drives me hazy:
am I or are the others crazy?
—Albert Einstein, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch



This is love: to fly toward a mysterious sky,
to cause ten thousand veils to fall.
First, to stop clinging to life,
then to step out, without feet ...
—Rumi, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch



To live without philosophizing is to close one's eyes and never attempt to open them. – Rene Descartes, loose translation by Michael R. Burch



Stage Fright
by Michael R. Burch

To be or not to be?
In the end Hamlet
opted for naught.



I test the tightrope
balancing a child
in each arm.
—Vera Pavlova, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch



Brief Fling
by Michael R. Burch

“Epigram”
means cram,
then scram!



*******
by Michael R. Burch

You came to me as rain breaks on the desert
when every flower springs to life at once.
But joys are wan illusions to the expert:
the Bedouin has learned how not to want.



Love is either wholly folly,
or fully holy.
—Michael R. Burch



Intimations
by Michael R. Burch

Let mercy surround us
with a sweet persistence.

Let love propound to us
that life is infinitely more than existence.



Less Heroic Couplets: Marketing 101
by Michael R. Burch

Building her brand, she disrobes,
naked, except for her earlobes.



Villanelle of an Opportunist
by Michael R. Burch

I’m not looking for someone to save.
A gal has to do what a gal has to do:
I’m looking for a man with one foot in the grave.

How many highways to hell must I pave
with intentions imagined, not true?
I’m not looking for someone to save.

Fools praise compassion while weaklings rave,
but a gal has to do what a gal has to do.
I’m looking for a man with one foot in the grave.

Some praise the Lord but the Devil’s my fave
because he has led me to you!
I’m not looking for someone to save.

In the land of the free and the home of the brave,
a gal has to do what a gal has to do.
I’m looking for a man with one foot in the grave.

Every day without meds becomes a close shave
and the razor keeps tempting me too.
I’m not looking for someone to save:
I’m looking for a man with one foot in the grave.



She is brighter than dawn
by Michael R. Burch

for Beth

There’s a light about her
like the moon through a mist:
a bright incandescence
with which she is blessed

and my heart to her light
like the tide now is pulled . . .
she is fair, O, and bright
like the moon silver-veiled.

There’s a fire within her
like the sun’s leaping forth
to lap up the darkness
of night from earth's hearth

and my eyes to her flame
like twin moths now are drawn
till my heart is consumed.
She is brighter than dawn.




Teddy Roosevelt spoke softly and carried a big stick; Donald Trump speaks loudly and carries a big shtick.—Michael R. Burch



Viral Donald (I)
by Michael R. Burch aka "The Loyal Opposition"

Donald Trump is coronaviral:
his brain's in a downward spiral.
His pale nimbus of hair
proves there's nothing up there
but an empty skull, fluff and denial.



Viral Donald (II)
by Michael R. Burch aka "The Loyal Opposition"

Why didn't Herr Trump, the POTUS,
protect us from the Coronavirus?
That weird orange corona of hair's an alarm:
Trump is the Virus in Human Form!

I don't have butterflies fluttering about my tummy.
It's more like
a large mass of dead butterflies
rolling around,
smacking and tearing my stomach walls.
The butterflies start out happy and well,
flitting about, jostling merrily,
wings glimmering, flying wondrously.
Then,
they lose their energy,
collapse and die,
Their fragile bodies crumpling
like bits of sticks
as each leg and antennae snaps off and falls
to the bottom.
They decay and collect
as more and more butterflies give up,
give in, and drop.

I am left with nothing but
this heaving mess of dead insects in my stomach.

I feel sick.

I kissed those lips so many times,
I held you as you caressed me to your will,

heat's rising between the two of us

& I'm becoming intoxicated
by your lustful glares-

As you stare deep into my eyes

while you deviously - lavishly

lick & **** betwixt my legs...

Pulsations consuming my very thoughts

I was to be the one to ******

once I finished my seductive belly dance...

You've surpassed me - grabbing

my dancers gear,

ripping fabric as you

feverishly kissed my gaping- shocked

"wide open" mouth.

Sweet ecstasy's taking

over every part of my being.

Your tantalizing tongue  

teasing in and out


of me as I spread wider for you.....

I rant the silence  with lustful

passionate screams as wave after

seductive  waves

pulsate through me all the way to my toes.

I'm hurting in a good way as you climb up over me


slowly so wondrously slow


you enter me,



moving deeper


ummm


deeeeeperrrr.....

I feel Oh


YESSSS...............

I  come wake


sadly it's only


a dream!

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may tread me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin' in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may **** me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

Catatonic inscriptions etches through my textile discernment
Insidious cycles of turmoil encased within a festering distress
Uncertainty obscures my comfort into a chaotic complacency
Transforming the subtle movement of thought and bewilderment
Through the re-occurring sequences of paranoia and my uneasy psychosis
Haunting the whole of this psyche and the mental state I've come to fancy

A tell-tale apprehension of merriment and contentment may be a dismal reality
All the while being obsessed with the unfavorable outcomes I conjure within
But, I can't get enough of the disarray that breeds within my frail skull
So distant from what I feel in the ecstasy of my self-selected normality
The meek proposal of sanity has little to hold against these crooked grins
As this chaotic thought process leaves rationality as a vague ideal to null

Expansive introspection has no limit to what is perceived as validity
And, to be enveloped in the ambiguity and delusion of fact is so enticing
We all know that we've all come to recognize the fabrication of our own truth
The futile attempts to obtain an immaculate conviction in pure solidity
Is so wondrously perfunctory and constant as the life that i'm living
That I dread the day of departure from this hysteric observance of aging youth

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may tread me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom? 'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin' in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may **** me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?
Out of the huts of history's shame
I riseup from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise

you may write me down in history
with your bitter, twisted lies,
you may tread me in the very dirt,
but still, like dust, I’ll rise

does my clumsiness upset you?
why are you beset with gloom?
‘cause I walk like I’ve got oil wells
pumping in my living room.

just like moons and like suns,
with the certainty of tides,
just like hopes springing high,
still I’ll rise

did you want to see me broken?
bowed head and lowered eyes?
shoulders falling down like teardrops
weakened by my soulful cries.

does my haughtiness offend you?
don’t take it awful hard
‘cause I laugh like I’ve got gold mines
diggin’ in my own backyard.

you may shoot me with your words,
you may cut me with your eyes,
you may **** me with your hatefulness,
but still, like air, I’ll rise.

does my hotness upset you?
does it come as a surprise?
that I dance like I’ve got diamonds
at the meething of my thighs?

out of the huts of history’s shame
I rise
up from a past that’s been rooted in pain
I rise
I’m a black ocean, leaping and wide,
welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear
I rise
bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
i am the dream and hope of the slave.
i rise
i rise
i rise
— A.P.

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.

1 -
a therapeutic calm wafted across the valley
and a wispy mist in blue filled the still air
i stood transfixed on the tense river bank
seeing and not believing this magical sight
that on my mind weren't ever a blight

                               - 2 -
a frog with a bobbing throat leapt into the water
and sent a ripple that crept up the serene pond
till in time it reached the floater of my line
whereupon i felt a grip upon my timid heart
and a fish bigger than in stories broke the surface

                              - 3-
in that mystical moment the scales fell from my eyes
and i beheld a sight most wondrously mesmerizing
for there upon a delicate water lily in ballerina pose
was a maid with a beauty that no artist could conceive
in a soon forgotten sluggish million years or more

                           - 4 -
her eyes were like twinkling stars recently escaped
from the whirling depths of a cosmic wormhole
her nose was like a bridge to whimsical fantasy
and she beckoned to me with ever-increasing urgency
till i felt my will melt before her seductive wiles

                           - 5 -
then the voice of my mother called me from the edge
and the sleep induced by the moment began to dissipate
the maid began a dance like one for her nuptials
and the sound of distant drums bore into my soul
in faint echoes that were forever sinking into endless time

                            - 6 -
as in a surrealistic dream before the break of another day
the frog leapt out of the pond and onto the grassy bank
from the lily, like a fancy, the dancing maid disappeared
and there was neither mist nor breeze as i stood there
alone again with my fishing line and my baffled thoughts

I was a queen, and I have lost my crown;
A wife, and I have broken all my vows;
A lover, and I ruined him I loved:—
There is no other havoc left to do.
A little month ago I was a queen,
And mothers held their babies up to see
When I came riding out of Camelot.
The women smiled, and all the world smiled too.
And now, what woman’s eyes would smile on me?
I still am beautiful, and yet what child
Would think of me as some high, heaven-sent thing,
An angel, clad in gold and miniver?
The world would run from me, and yet am I
No different from the queen they used to love.
If water, flowing silver over stones,
Is forded, and beneath the horses’ feet
Grows turbid suddenly, it clears again,
And men will drink it with no thought of harm.
Yet I am branded for a single fault.

I was the flower amid a toiling world,
Where people smiled to see one happy thing,
And they were proud and glad to raise me high;
They only asked that I should be right fair,
A little kind, and gowned wondrously,
And surely it were little praise to me
If I had pleased them well throughout my life.

I was a queen, the daughter of a king.
The crown was never heavy on my head,
It was my right, and was a part of me.
The women thought me proud, the men were kind,
And bowed right gallantly to kiss my hand,
And watched me as I passed them calmly by,
Along the halls I shall not tread again.
What if, to-night, I should revisit them?
The warders at the gates, the kitchen-maids,
The very beggars would stand off from me,
And I, their queen, would climb the stairs alone,
Pass through the banquet-hall, a loathed thing,
And seek my chambers for a hiding-place,
And I should find them but a sepulchre,
The very rushes rotted on the floors,
The fire in ashes on the freezing hearth.
I was a queen, and he who loved me best
Made me a woman for a night and day,
And now I go unqueened forevermore.
A queen should never dream on summer eves,
When hovering spells are heavy in the dusk:—
I think no night was ever quite so still,
So smoothly lit with red along the west,
So deeply hushed with quiet through and through.
And strangely clear, and deeply dyed with light,
The trees stood straight against a paling sky,
With Venus burning lamp-like in the west.

I walked alone amid a thousand flowers,
That drooped their heads and drowsed beneath the dew,
And all my thoughts were quieted to sleep.
Behind me, on the walk, I heard a step—
I did not know my heart could tell his tread,
I did not know I loved him till that hour.
Within my breast I felt a wild, sick pain,
The garden reeled a little, I was weak,
And quick he came behind me, caught my arms,
That ached beneath his touch; and then I swayed,
My head fell backward and I saw his face.

All this grows bitter that was once so sweet,
And many mouths must drain the dregs of it.
But none will pity me, nor pity him
Whom Love so lashed, and with such cruel thongs.

Second-hand smoke
thrums within my ribcage
and I notice every atom
from top to bottom
crannies and nooks
mahogany lava
flooding over shoulders
blue-streaked toes

I can't look away
I don't want to look away
at the way
she holds a cigarette
lazy between *******
and the impish half-smile
that says everything perhaps
and perhaps nothing
a Picasso masterpiece
but it's only lips
it's only the girl
they all call Alaska
a walking storm in flip-flops
from room forty-eight

the static we have
simmers upon my tongue
or is it just Mountain Dew

words belonging to Vonnegut
drop from the leaves
sparkle like drizzle
and kiss every clover
good evening goodnight
goodbye

I have plunged into her pool
of wine and waterlogged literature
I see it I know it I want
to take a drag of her
glide inside her nirvana
hear her smile
with a crush of emeralds
wild in my eyes
a throb of electricity
that rockets through
my crooked veins
and I want a taste
as if squeezing a lemon
and the sugar cascades
liquor-like down my throat
straight and fast
to the last frontier

I see a chain of daisies
gush from her chest
crash at her feet
to be continued
I hope I hope
a phone is ringing
what country is calling?
is it where her vanilla whisper
leaves me wondrously numb?
a fuzzy echo hums
inside my ears
I ask is it over?
Is it done?

and then ****
I'm awake
and her name
has vanished
as fast as a ghost
disintegrated
like the cigarette she held
lazy between *******.