‘Tis the day to care for each other and to join hands
Friendship matters, love matters
Flowers matter too, brothers and sisters
Please do not be too mad
Because the sky is not blue
Let’s enjoy the morning dew
Please do not be too sad
Let’s enjoy the cold sunny weather
There’s snow here and there, but at the corner
Is spring with fresh air and a bundle of flowers
Throughout the coldest days of the mighty winter
Think of a sweet spring and dream of a mild summer
During the harshest hours of the wintry night
Think of flowers and dream of a pleasant sunlight.
Season comes, remains a bit and then flees
Life goes through a circular event like the bees
Like the moonbeams dancing around Mother Earth
In order to charm, embrace and kiss her to death.
For crying out loud
Due to the outcome
I was not particularly proud
For more than two centuries, election days go and come
At a similar season, every four years
This time, there were plenty of wows and tears
Of disappointment, heartbreak, anger, anxiety and sadness
And the other half was full of glee or happiness
Such is life. Politics is a dirty and unpredictable animal
No, America did not die. Things are normal
We’re still talking about immigration, liberty
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
This is a sonnet despite the nonstandard stanza breaks. It was inspired by Dylan Thomas's poem "The force that through the green fuse drives the flower."
There’s a Stirring and Awakening in the World
by Michael R. Burch
There’s a stirring and awakening in the world,
and even so my spirit stirs within,
imagining some Power beckoning—
the Force which through the stamen gently whirrs,
unlocking tumblers deftly, even mine.
Spring Was Delayed
by Michael R. Burch
Winter came early:
the driving snows,
the delicate frosts
that crystallize
all we forget
or refuse to know,
all we regret
that makes us wise.
Spring was delayed:
the nubile rose,
the tentative sun,
the wind’s soft sighs,
all we omit
or refuse to show,
whatever we shield
behind guarded eyes.
Originally published by Borderless Journal
***
These are original haiku written by Michael R. Burch, many of them under the influence of the Oriental masters of the form.
Dark-bosomed clouds
pregnant with heavy thunder ...
the water breaks
—Michael R. Burch
***
Silver
by Michael R. Burch
seeds
impregnate the earth
whispering and loving its children
grown among the wandering souls
each morning in spring
where it is quiet
where we sit in silence
to behold the morning sun
I
I saw a staring virgin stand
Where holy Dionysus died,
And tear the heart out of his side.
And lay the heart upon her hand
And bear that beating heart away;
Of Magnus Annus at the spring,
As though God's death were but a play.
Another Troy must rise and set,
Another lineage feed the crow,
Another Argo's painted prow
Drive to a flashier bauble yet.
The Roman Empire stood appalled:
It dropped the reins of peace and war
When that fierce virgin and her Star
(Suggested by the lives of Napoleon and Josephine.)
I.
ONE night was full of rapture and delight-
Of reunited arms and swooning kisses,
And all the unnamed and unnumbered blisses
Which fond souls find in love of love at night.
Heart beat with heart, and each clung into each
With twining arms that did but loose their hold
To cling still closer; and fond glances told
These truths for which there is no uttered speech.
There was sweet laughter and endearing words,
