The Watergaw
Hugh MacDiarmid wrote "The Watergaw" in a Scots dialect. I have translated the poem into modern English to make it easier to read and understand. A watergaw is a fragmentary rainbow.
The Watergaw
by Hugh MacDiarmid
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Nightfall
"Nightfall" is a poem I wrote for my fellow poet and friend Kevin Nicholas Roberts, shortly after his death.
Nightfall
by Michael R. Burch
for Kevin Nicholas Roberts
Only the long dolor of dusk delights me now,
as I await death.
The rain has ruined the unborn corn,
and the wasting breath
of autumn has cruelly, savagely shorn
each ear of its radiant health.
As the golden sun dims, so the dying land seems to relinquish its vanishing wealth.
Villanelles
These are villanelles by Michael R. Burch.
Remembering Not to Call
by Michael R. Burch
a villanelle permitting mourning, for my mother, Christine Ena Burch
The hardest thing of all,
after telling her everything,
is remembering not to call.
Now the phone hanging on the wall
will never announce her ring:
the hardest thing of all
for children, however tall.
Poems for Fathers and Grandfathers
These are poems for fathers and grandfathers, written by Michael R. Burch.
Sunset
by Michael R. Burch
This poem is dedicated to my grandfather, George Edwin Hurt Sr.
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.
Free Fall
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.
Early Poems VII
These are early poems I write as a boy starting around age elven, then as a teenager in high school and during my first two years of college.
Huntress
by Michael R. Burch
after Baudelaire
alone in the bush
alone in the bush
where night is calling
within the open sky
as dark as the one I love
I wander in the sand
while cutting twigs in a path
the bells have echoed
somewhere in the night
this midnight soup
has broken up my dreams
a strand in circles
a ring that never ends
Carmen Deific
I .
Awake, awake, ye Nations, now the Lord of Hosts goes by!
Sing ye His praise, O happy souls, who smile beneath the sky!
Join in the song, O martyr'd ones, where'er ye droop and die!
The Lord goes marching on!
'Mid tramp and clangour of the winds and clash of clouds that meet,
He passeth on His way and treads the Lost beneath His feet;
His legions are the winged Storms that follow fast and fleet
Their Master marching on!
From battlefield to battlefield He wends in royal array,
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Two Songs Rewritten For The Tune's Sake
I
My Paistin Finn is my sole desire,
And I am shrunken to skin and bone,
For all my heart has had for its hire
Is what I can whistle alone and alone.
Oro, oro.!
Tomorrow night I will break down the door.
What is the good of a man and he
Alone and alone, with a speckled shin?
I would that I drank with my love on my knee
Between two barrels at the inn.
Oro, oro.!
To-morrow night I will break down the door.
Alone and alone nine nights I lay
Between two bushes under the rain;
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Two Songs From a Play
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
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