These streets that I walk
Are treacherous with every other step
No compass in my hand to guide me
I allow the light of the sky to illuminate my path
There’s no straight and narrow to speak of
Wishful thinking that’s been a forever desire
I have the mental bruises that show the impatience of wait
I have the physical pain in my feet from the many travels
These are poems about sunset, poems about the song going down and things irretrivably lost, poems about regret.
Sunset
by Michael R. Burch
for my grandfather, George Edwin Hurt Sr., on the day he departed this life
Between the prophecies of morning
and twilight's revelations of wonder,
the sky is ripped asunder.
The moon lurks in the clouds,
waiting, as if to plunder
the dusk of its lilac iridescence,
and in the bright-tentacled sunset
we imagine a presence
full of the fury of lost innocence.
Man had dreamed of Luna’s silver seas
Since first He gazed into the spangled skies.
What secrets lay behind Her gleam?
What treasures hid beneath Her skin?
Would She welcome Him with open arms,
Or spurn His advances with cold distain?
He tried to catch Her fancy with sacrifice,
Howled like the wolf with bloody hands,
But still She hung impervious,
Indifferent to His pleas.
Forward swept the sea of time,
Moonlight guiding Man’s ambitions—
One by one the continents fell
Conquered by the hand of Man.
These are villanelles by Michael R. Burch, including an adaptation he calls a Trinelle or Triplenelle. There are also related poetic forms with refrains, such as the rondel, roundel and rondeau.
Villanelle: The Divide
by Michael R. Burch
The sea was not salt the first tide...
was man born to sorrow that first day,
with the moon―a pale beacon across the Divide,
the brighter for longing, an object denied―
the tug at his heart's pink, bourgeoning clay?
These are poems about fall, falls and falling, whether in love or literally ...
Free Fall
by Michael R. Burch
for Beth
These cloudless nights, the sky becomes a wheel
where suns revolve around an axle star ...
Look there, and choose. Decide which moon is yours.
Sink Lethe-ward, held only by a heel.
These are my modern English translations of poems by Hafez aka Hafiz.
The heart is the thousand-stringed lyre
Tuned to the chords of Love.
—Hafez, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
***
Dispensing Keys
by Hafez
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
"Listen" is a prophetic poem I wrote around age 17 or 18, then revised and completed around 20 years later.
Listen
by Michael R. Burch
also published as Immanuel A. Michael
Listen to me now and heed my voice;
I am a madman, alone, screaming in the wilderness,
but listen now.
Listen to me now, and if I say
that black is black, and white is white, and in between lies gray,
I have no choice.
Does a madman choose his words? They come to him,
the moon’s illuminations, intimations of the wind,
and he must speak.
for Beth
Have you tasted the bitterness of tears of despair?
Have you watched the sun sink through such pale, balmless air
that your soul sought its shell like a crab on a beach,
then scuttled inside to be safe, out of reach?
Might I lift you tonight from earth’s wreckage and damage
on these waves gently rising to pay the moon homage?
Or better, perhaps, let me say that I, too,
have dreamed of infinity . . . windswept and blue.
Howling at the Moon
On a moonlit late night
I sat in a bar
Drinking drams of demented, fermented dream dew
Just an unhinged lunatic
Dreaming of howling at the full moon
Watching the world walk by
Looking at all the fine-looking babes
Walking by the street
Thinking wild, erotic thoughts
Of endless wild libertine passions
When into the bar
Walked the most beautiful women
In the Universe
So wild, so free
So wonderfully alive
The moon shone bright that night
Beautiful and full.
I can still picture it.
It was magical the way the light danced.
It swallowed every star in the sky
In its majestic glow.
Tonight, however, the moon is gone.
I don’t know where it went.
I wish it would come back
To light up the darkness like it once did
But wherever it’s gone, I hope it’s happier there.
