sonnet

These are sonnets by Michael R. Burch. Many of these sonnets are "heretical" sonnets in that they disobey the rules of orthodox sonnets and return to the original definition of "sonnet" as a "little song." Included are Shakespearean sonnets, Petrarchan sonnets, Spenserian sonnets, blank verse sonnets, free verse sonnets and experimental sonnets.

Lady’s Favor
by Michael R. Burch

"AFTER CUMMINGS" POEMS

These are poems that I have written "after" e. e. cummings. Many of these poem were written during my early "Cummings Period," which started around age 14-15 when I discovered his poems in an English textbook. I have a cummings-ish type of poem that I call a "ur" poem. I will explain that modus operandi when we get to the first "ur" poem.

POEMS ABOUT SHAKESPEARE by Michael R. Burch

These are poems I have written about Shakespeare, poems I have written for Shakespeare, and poems I have written after Shakespeare.

Fleet Tweet: Apologies to Shakespeare
by Michael R. Burch

a tweet
by any other name
would be as fleet!
@mikerburch

Fleet Tweet II: Further Apologies to Shakespeare
by Michael R. Burch

Remember, doggonit,
heroic verse crowns the Shakespearean sonnet!
So if you intend to write a couplet,
please do it on the doublet!
@mikerburch

These are English translations of Spanish poems written by Pablo Neruda, along with translations of select epigrams and quotes.

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

Hymn to an Art-o-matic Laundromat
by Michael R. Burch

after Richard Thomas Moore’s “Hymn to an Automatic Washer”

These are poems about flight, poems about flying, and poems about flights of fancy like those of Peter Pan ...

"Flight 93" is a sonnet I wrote in response to the events of 9-11 ...

Flight 93
by Michael R. Burch

I held the switch in trembling fingers, asked
why existence felt so small, so purposeless,
like a minnow wriggling feebly in my grasp ...

vibrations of huge engines thrummed my arms
as, glistening with sweat, I nudged the switch
to OFF ... I heard the klaxon's shrill alarms

This is my first sonnet, written as a teen, followed by other early sonnets and sonnet-like poems of mine ...

Sonnet 130 Refuted
by Michael R. Burch

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red ...
— Shakespeare, Sonnet 130

Along the stone-tipped buildings, glass reflects
The water ripples flowing near, where home’s
A memory uncorked and lost, complex
As photos seen in every road one roams.
Now winter’s worn the road some fifteen years,
The covered clouds are broken by the sun
And wind-whipped rain blows on till pathways clear
With breath blown in from cold where there is none.
Above looms fog that wafts up from the shrubs
Where herons gather in a game of chance
Along a path where holy men proceed to scrub
The frozen customs free in wartime dance.

For Boris and Miona
 
They find a garden lush with plum-air scents
As spring sun filters through the dew-dust leaves
And subtle sighs arise while fruit ferments,
For Eden enters Earth when minds conceive.
 
Within the garden deep an oak tree grows,
Preserving plum and fruit from sudden squalls
With roots that sink in soil where winds oppose,
To keep the flowers fresh as flurries fall.
 
Emerging from primordial chaos fair,
This Earth now holds the veins where plum wine flows: