Karen Bookguilder is intended to be a collection of poems 60 poems expressly for the Book Guild
by Mike Burr - the themes being dictated by or about its published artisans .
Devil
that birth in the dirt !
i pronounced
'i am coming and into this world'
and without equivocation i came
and so caused my mothers death
for in those days there were only herbal lore
to staunch the bleeding
that very hereafter and the moments of grief that followed
i was not party to
but i was made to feel its echo
and the guilty burden of that echo
by those that knew her or of her
caustic eyes that in their soda houses said
'theres the devil in the child'
although i did not understand at first
and wondered how could a name distil so little joy
and that name was mine
it was Adam