love

These are my modern English translations of haiku about plum blossoms, plums and plum trees. In Japanese poetry the plum ("ume") is associated with the beginning of spring and good fortune; plum trees were often planted facing northeast to ward off bad luck. Plum blossoms are widely loved and appreciated by the Japanese people; they symbolize refinement, purity, nobility and the remembrance of love.

Picking autumn plums
my wrinkled hands
once again grow fragrant
― Yosa Buson, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

These are poems I call my Fables...

Will There Be Starlight
by Michael R. Burch

for Beth

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

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

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

PABLO NERUDA TRANSLATIONS

You can crop all the flowers but you cannot detain spring.
―Pablo Neruda, loose translation by Michael R. Burch

While nothing can save us from death,
still love can redeem each breath.
―Pablo Neruda, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

As if you were set on fire from within,
the moon whitens your skin.
—Pablo Neruda, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Erotic Errata
by Michael R. Burch
I didn’t mean to love you; if I did,
it came unbid-
en, and should’ve remained hid-
den!

***

Less Heroic Couplets: Marketing 101
by Michael R. Burch

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

***

Negligibles
by Michael R. Burch

Show me your most intimate items of apparel;
begin with the hem of your quicksilver slip ...

***

Kenj ever lasting sun Ozge

Though the sun always been bright
And earth been always in light
Hep it was too dark
Till my eyes fell in with yours
Till my heart beats met with yee's
The frequency that could come into existence
The depth of affection
Pleasures love and passion
The three in one;
turned my world into a brightful loveful
I owe to universe a lot
I owe to your family much
I owe to you my love

Every day shine my sun
The sun that the flowers fade without

Love, a little church that standing all alone,

waits with open doors,

but nobody goes there to pray,

the prayers will go unsaid, now, where to go?

which way? love, be my beacon,

teach me to look at an empty sky without fear.

There is a land by faith I’ve seen

Where skies no clouded regions know;

Where they know not the sorrows of time

and no shadows fall to blight the view

That land no want has ever known,

Nor pain nor sickness nor distress;

there, Death, the last enemy, is slain;

There those who meet shall part no more,

And those long parted meet again.

There’s a land far away..

Beyond these wild winds and gloomy skies,

Beyond Death’s cloudy portal,

There is a land where beauty never dies

And love becomes immortal;

This is my modern English translation of a French poem by Voltaire, one of my all-time favorite writers. The poem is followed by two translations of epigrams by Voltaire.

Les Vous et Les Tu (“You, then and now”)
by Voltaire
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

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The Shijing or Shi-Jing or Shih-Ching (“Book of Songs” or “Book of Odes”) is the oldest Chinese poetry collection, with the poems included believed to date from around 1200 BC to 600 BC. According to tradition the poems were selected and edited by Confucius himself. Since most ancient poetry did not rhyme, these may be the world’s oldest extant rhyming poems.

Shijing Ode #4: “JIU MU”
ancient Chinese rhyming poem circa (1200 BC - 600 BC)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch