"phonograph" poems
Thomas Alva Edison,
A most unusual boy,
Never really bothered much
With any childish toy.
His teacher thought he couldn't learn
And sent him home from school,
But tommy's mother knew for sure
He wasn't any fool.
He worked as a news boy on train,
He learnt to telegraph
In a way he concentrated
Made some people laugh.
Thomas alva Edison
had inventions by the score.
In his laboratory
he kept inventing more.
the phonograph,electric light
(with fuses sockets too),
a super storage battery,
and movies ,were a few.
If not for Mr.Edison
How dull our lives would be!
We might not have the radio,
The X-ray,or TV
-almighty emperor (premanand)
Feb 26, 2015
Feb 26, 2015 at 10:05 AM UTC
They enter the café just as some sappy pop song is playing
They order then immediately hug
Embrace
Swaying to one side, together, like the wind
Encircling the leaning tower of Pisa
Then teetering to the other solstice
Foot to foot, smile to smile, hand round skirted waist
Forearm resting on his tall blazered shoulders
This is forgivable in the young
Those teeny-boppers with defiant hair-cuts and posters
However, he has peppered hair
She, though voluptuous and tanned,
Must be in her 30s.
“Affair.”
My cynical devil snickers, between sips
But I sit mesmerized, and for the first time ever
Envious.
The chairs and the tables somehow seem more distant
The song now sounds as if it’s funneled through some crackling phonograph
The very light disentangles itself from stones
It’s as if a sky has opened up in my chest
Flying high overhead, one lone raven,
Its slow shadow
Gliding across my heart
Oh, how I miss you
5 states away
I see your smile on magazine covers
I vaguely sniff your scent on passing women
Yet you remain elusive - immaterial, haunting,
While this visceral assault
Leaves me bewildered - empty
An echo in a chiaroscuro cavern
Fading for thee
Jul 28, 2016
Jul 28, 2016 at 5:31 PM UTC
(the phonograph’s voice like a keen spider skipping
quickly over patriotic swill.
The,negress,in the,rocker by the,curb,tipping
and tipping,the flocks of pigeons. And the skil-
ful loneliness,and the rather fat
man in bluishsuspenders half-reading the
Evening Something
in the normal window. and a cat.
A cat waiting for god knows makes me
wonder if i’m alive(eye pries,
not open. Tail stirs.) And the. fire-escapes—
the night. makes me wonder if,if i am
the face of a baby smeared with beautiful jam
or
my invincible Nearness rapes
laughter from your preferable,eyes
6k
The farthest man made object in space, Voyager 1,
is over 20 billion km away from Earth.
On board is a phonograph record, brilliant gold,
containing sounds and images of what life is like on earth,
A message to whoever is able to listen, a literal shot in the dark.
On it is an inscription that is perhaps the most beautiful sentence
I have ever read
TO THE MAKERS OF MUSIC
ALL TIMES
ALL WORLDS
a time capsule, a gift, from us
To anywhere and everywhere
A hundred years from now or a thousand
Our belief that no matter what time
Or world you belong to, melody and harmony and rhythm, can bring us together, can communicate.
On the cover
Are figures, explaining how to operate this record
Hieroglyphics from what by then
Would be ancient history
Messages in binary, the 1s and 0s
Our position in the universe marked by our distances
from gigantic pulsars, the star map to our home,
the creators of this message
There's beauty in this marriage of math and art
Code and music
As a way to communicate with the universe.
Some of the images on the record are
the most beautifully simple ones,
Of us, humans, drinking and eating, laughing,
of animals, nature, food and architecture.
Then there are images of our scientific observations,
mathematical calculations, our discoveries,
Like a child showing off
Look, look what I can do!
Black and white and in colour,
Pictures, proof that we, indeed have lived and achieved.
The music, classical, our very best from Bach and Mozart
to Blind Willie Johnson's Dark was the Night.
But all of this can only matter, can come to fruition
if someone exists to receive it, and is evolved enough
to comprehend what it means.
But that's the thing, everybody knows,
That's there's a slim chance of this record ever being heard,
and it's much more possible that the Voyager will simply end up as floating debris in the cosmos, but it doesn't matter!
We just want someone to know that there was a species of bipedal, intelligent animals on this blue planet,
no different than finding graffiti in alleys that read I WAS HERE.
WE WERE HERE, WE EXISTED.
And it's all about that hope, the hope that someone will see us,
our pictures, listen to our languages, our greetings, our music, and remember us, even after we're long gone.
Or perhaps we will one day be interstellar space faring people as well, following the path of the Voyager, doing what we do best,
Explore.
Jan 2, 2016
Jan 2, 2016 at 9:32 AM UTC
we want to say that we built this house with our hands
with our blood
we built this house and burned it down
we rebuilt this house and burned it down
we rebuilt this house and stayed
i want to tell you that my father builds houses for a living but i have never lived in one
i want to tell you that my mother still asks how you're doing
i want to say that we built this house and it's never abandoned and we are never waiting by the windows
that we always have wood for the fireplace
we never drink alone
i never fall asleep in the shower
in this house our love keeps the lights on
you can feel it through the floorboards like vibrations through a phonograph through the hardwood through your back
we sleep monday through thursday and get paid on weekends to drink whiskey and slow dance in the kitchen
we roll around in bed trying to catch the light
our bodies become curtains or sponges
you soak me up like sunshine and nobody asks where i went
we always finish what we start
i become welcome mat, welcome back, come back,
come home
i turned the basement into a music room
when it rains for you it never floods
we built this house with our hands, with our love, with our blood
there is wood for the fireplace
the flames never spread
Oct 12, 2015
Oct 12, 2015 at 5:49 PM UTC
HaHA, I've done it! I've created a device
That can tap into my subconscious
and translate it for all to hear.
I will win the Nobel Prize!
I will be rich beyond my wildest dreams!
People will LIKE me!
So let's see here....I put on the cap, set the throttobombulator to 8.
Adjust for fuzzy dialation...set the circuit threshold to .79, make
sure the lucid translation synapses are firing...and yes. The next
words you hear will surely be written in History books one day,
much like Thomas Edison's first phonograph recording, or the
first telephone call!
Neural connection is active. Transmitting
**TRANSGENDERED KANGAROOS FORNICATE IN THE
PURPLE SHADE OF BETTE MIDLER'S THIGHS. PLEASE
PERFORM ******** AT THE BEHEST OF BUDDHIST
MONKS WITH LISPS. COUNT TO TEN AND BECOME
A BUXOM BLONDE ***** WITH BOUNCY *******
WHEN THE CLOCK STRIKES TWELVE, CINDARELLA IS
ON HER KNEES AND ELBOWS BECAUSE IT'S ******
HARD TO GET LOW ENOUGH TO PLEASURE A DWARF**
Oh dear. This can't be right....now where's that 'off' switch?
**JACK AND JILL WENT OFF THE PILL SO JACK COULD
BE A FATHER. JACK WENT DOWN TO LONDON TOWN
AND PUNCHED THE DALAI LAMA. EDIBLE *******
GIVE YOU INDIGESTION. DO YOU KISS YOUR MOTHER
WITH THAT MOUTH, BECAUSE YOU SHOULD. (AND USE
SOME TONGUE THIS TIME)**
Oh My...Ladies and Gentlemen, It's clear that my invention
is experiencing technical difficulties. If you would please be patient---
**SATIN BRAS DON'T CHAFE. NONE OF THE SMURFS
HAD BLUE ***** THANKS TO SMURFETTE. I WONDER
WHAT MARY MAGDELINE WAS LIKE IN THE SACK? **
STUPIDSmashPieceSmashof GARBAGESMASH
DoNT LikE iT? tucK iT bAcK!!
Connection Lost
I...erm...clearly have some more work to do before it is ready
for the pubic--er..public. I have run into some...translation
errors...and need to re lubricate--CALIBRATE a few things.
Please don't tell my mother.
Feb 8, 2012
Feb 8, 2012 at 12:12 AM UTC
Her heart is a broken record
Constantly being scratched by knives and scissors
Lost in their quest to find a spot still intact
When put in the old phonograph
It plays a soft melody filled with piano notes
That sound like rain on a gray day
The strings of the violin echoes in the background
Along with the lower tones of the cellos
The solitary saxophone cries;
The flutes and clarinets follow its lead,
Desperately letting out their high notes of agony
Drums emerge blasting anger
Encouraging the rest of the instruments to go along
And when it is about to hit its ******
Another scratch – a deep crooked scratch.
It takes a while before the song starts over.
It’s hard to imagine
This was once a beautiful, shiny vinyl
That stood up in the wooden shelf
Now it is filled with dust
Making company – only – to the Merlot sitting by the desk
And to the ears that can hear nothing
But the harmony of the broken hearted.
Apr 10, 2014
Apr 10, 2014 at 12:04 PM UTC
(To JS/07/M/378/ This Marble Monument
Is Erected by the State)
He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be
One against whom there was no official complaint,
And all the reports on his conduct agree
That, in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a
saint,
For in everything he did he served the Greater Community.
Except for the War till the day he retired
He worked in a factory and never got fired
But satisfied his employers, Fudge Motors Inc.
Yet he wasn't a scab or odd in his views,
For his Union reports that he paid his dues,
(Our report on his Union shows it was sound)
And our Social Psychology workers found
That he was popular with his mates and liked a drink.
The Press are convinced that he bought a paper every day
And that his reactions to advertisements were normal in every
way.
Policies taken out in his name prove that he was fully insured,
And his Health-card shows he was once in hospital but left it
cured.
Both Producers Research and High-Grade Living declare
He was fully sensible to the advantages of the Installment Plan
And had everything necessary to the Modern Man,
A phonograph, a radio, a car and a frigidaire.
Our researchers into Public Opinion are content
That he held the proper opinions for the time of year;
When there was peace, he was for peace: when there was war,
he went.
He was married and added five children to the population,
Which our Eugenist says was the right number for a parent of
his generation.
And our teachers report that he never interfered with their
education.
Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd:
Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard.
2.1k
.
*One day at a time
swings the pendulum;
only love awakens senses
too ephemeral to be restrained,
like the magic of a phonograph stylus
in a vintage vinyl groove
and the sensual touch
of skin so new
It's not easy to watch
a flock flying away
in the distance,
seeing the expanse beyond
reach of a wandering mind;
heed distracted
by the slow sway
of the treetops hypnotic careen
Doves dive on feathered canter,
silent as the winged wind,
broke free from the gravity
befallen the weight
of the world
Looking up wondering
beyond the sky,
the passing clouds
crawl across
palliating the dusk hazed horizon
Synchronicity transcends across
an immeasurably deep river chasm,
into a wordless abyss
ensconced unthought
between
here and there
Silent silhouettes
glide across
the valley void below,
wings to the sky
and, if you listen to a moment breathe,
you can hear
the silent peace .............
you can feel the prevailing wind's direction
blowing through your soul*
Jesse Stillwater
December 2017
Jun 21, 2018
Jun 21, 2018 at 2:40 PM UTC
*I don’t remember ever seeing so much rain in California.
The great city of Los Angeles translates to the city of angels.
You can count the number of rainy days a year on two hands so
when I see so much water cut through the clouds
I can’t help but feel the tears of angels falling on my skin.
Recently my brain has been spinning in circles.
A needle scratching the surface to the melody of someone else’s face.
A phonograph that hasn’t turned on since the hopeless drunken nights
of butterflies trying to flutter through waterfalls.
Since then my heart has been handy
with the backs of a No. 2 pencils. Erasing the memory
of where this player’s off switch went.
I’m left with a familiar loop that feels like fine fleece cue tips
warming the inside of my ears,
wiping the very dust off my soul.
I'm taking the wheel of a mind and driving my madness to rainclouds.
Raindrops of today
filling the warm puddles of nostalgia for me to splash in once again.
So don’t ask me how old I am today
since my stomach is tied in boy scouts knots
as I think of the cocoa-colored eyes of my boy scout’s crush.
Dancing under the tears of angels with butterflies dancing back.
Being smart is a skill I’m good at,
but being foolish is a faculty I’ve mastered.
So I dance one step forward and two step back, laughing
while slipping off the nostalgia.
Falling down on butterflies that have grown strong enough to pick me back up.
You can call me crazy,
but the rainclouds above me never seem to last.*
Apr 6, 2014
Apr 6, 2014 at 6:51 PM UTC
first musical memory
playing Mary Poppins
over and over on my portable suitcase
phonograph
not convinced that
a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down
went over to my friends house
to play Barbies
heard B-B-B-Bennie and the Jets
on her record player
began my life long
love of rock music
grew up attending a Southern Baptist church
if my faith continues to evolve in and out of specific creeds and dogmatic beliefs
right arm will never fail to involuntarily rise
towards the Heavens
whenever i hear
How Great Thou Art being sung
parents were in their late 30's
by the time i was born
was exposed to big band music
show tunes
mom's favorite
French operatic singer Edith Piaf
Riverview Elementary
in music class
taught how to do The Hustle and The Bus Stop
to disco records
got to bring in
on Fridays
love of guys with
long hair
blame
on the big hair
bands
the 80's
the 90's
such a kinship to the dark depressing sounds of grunge
believed Scott Weiland
Kurt Cobain and
Jerry Cantrell
plagiarized my thoughts
mad or need to clean
my house
the 2 often go
hand in hand
heavy/nu metal blaring
at maximum volume
Currently
am at a crossroads
need of direction
helps me to undergo the deep soul searching
inecessary
major life changes are required
give myself vehicular therapy,
driving around Wilson Lake
symphonic classical sounds from the radio
surprisingly
maybe not
blaring
maximum
volume
brainstorming
my options
to the
music
overheard
ppl say
they wished that
their life
came with
a soundtrack
Mine does.
May 30, 2015
May 30, 2015 at 6:07 AM UTC
you are a pause
you are the second
before the air raid
an anticipation so loud it's deafening
you are the stillness, the static,
pins and needles between lightening
and thunder. 1. . . 2 . . . 3. . .
you are the heartbeat, last blink
separating bullet and flesh
crescent cuts bleed from empty hands
you are red lights. stop
knuckles white through a
raindropped windshield
you are elevators
early morning coffee stains
shifting eyes. look away.
you are the dead air
on a faraway radio station
bent antenna. turn the dial. silence
you are the needle
on that half broken phonograph
sidling arthritically away, back to sleep
you are the skip a beat
nervous lip bitten hesitation, envelope stamped
staring into the letter box. just let go
you are punctuation. . .
you are the hyphen
splitting words in two
leaving lonely nothings on different pages
you are 0:00
you are the force that
draws our eyes together
if only for an instant
Oct 15, 2012
Oct 15, 2012 at 9:00 PM UTC
last I checked it was 3 06 AM
the foggy window displayed scene to a rainy night of a
small town near the city of Chicago
your dim apartment filled sweetly with vanilla lavender aroma and the
delicate croon of Billie Holiday transcended from the living-room phonograph
a blue tin coffee *** pictorially placed upon faint orange flames
overdue library books and half-written notepads stacked symmetrically
within the oven of La Cornue Albertine ivory stove
you sat me atop the wooden counter of your tiny marble kitchen and
gently tucked at my stockings until they gracefully
renounced to the tile patterned floor
with your hands placed on either side of my thighs
you gradually - - -
kissed me softly on my knees
Jul 20, 2013
Jul 20, 2013 at 7:32 AM UTC
something looks and creeps on the countertop
parasitic cyst
up on the table
a phonograph feeding me from way back
a comatose short
you made me outnumbered and sorts
a different flesh
but you feel the edge
and feel suprised but
you know just what i am
a different life
and we were encumbered
and adorned
Dec 23, 2013
Dec 23, 2013 at 1:35 AM UTC
i only look good in half-light
with a cup of motivation
and music scratching in the tips of my ears
bare
no ill-fitting clothes
the ill-fitting skin is enough
just the meat suit and tight shadows
curling up my legs and over my arms,
twitching as they breathe down my neck,
it’s an incorporeal kind of feeling
this is a half-living you see,
the most effective coping method, i’ve found.
shut off half your brain and turn out all the lights
easier for the shadows to find you then
sit back
relax
let the phonograph sing you to a three-quarter dreamland where only the soft satin tendrils of sound stroke the insides of your earlobes and press themselves into your palms
fall back
Oct 3, 2013
Oct 3, 2013 at 12:47 AM UTC
gloomy sentiments flood my sea
nostalgic remembrance lingers
solo pienso en ti
deception camouflaged by roses
intimidated my sight, but
aun me acuerdo de los poses
ninguno lo ase como tu
I weep as I listen to the
phonograph that spins the blues
Apr 17, 2020
Apr 17, 2020 at 2:54 AM UTC
Never ending in my head
Notes I love and simultaneously dread
Dancing from ears to mind to tongue
Leaving not a single song unsung
Around and 'round the classy tune
Convinced I am the happiest loon
By this art that does consume me
Playing my heartstrings constantly
Dec 2, 2014
Dec 2, 2014 at 10:43 AM UTC
pencil shavings and falling snow,
records on the phonograph
playing songs from a lifetime ago
my body, my heart, is sore
and the melancholy mutations
of my future force me to burrow
deep, deep into the familiarity of
razors and a phone that no longer
rings, because there's no one to call
Feb 20, 2021
Feb 20, 2021 at 4:43 PM UTC
Fantastic fantasy flounders floundering in the fleece.
Fleeing fervent frustration faces, phasing in for free.
Final frolic frothy, frim and folly forth.
Felix feline fragranced friends and fluffy Faradays.
Apr 2, 2012
Apr 2, 2012 at 6:32 PM UTC
Oh woman, you've danced your dance
You're partied out, it's time to closet those pumps
But Mr. Phonograph has something to say
He plays the record
The one you're a fool for
And its vinyl
Written with biology
A siren's wailing
Scratches you in all the right places
You dance your dance
Throb with the tempo
Your mind stays yours
But that pretty young body don't
Every fiber knows
Why you curve in such pleasing ways
Why your lips pout so sweetly
They sing along
Peace is for those on either side of the mountain
Not at the peak
You could think in innocence
You will think in wisdom
But Mr. Phonograph has something to say
"now, you dance"
Oct 1, 2012
Oct 1, 2012 at 8:43 PM UTC
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Arthur Benjamin Franklin: my Unca Artie, my favorite. A High School football star, known as Red Franklin, he was famous for his dark red hair. He used to chuck me into deep water at Chrystal Pool to terrify me for 5 seconds, then hoist me onto his broad shoulders.I suspect I was his favorite too. War came and he had to go. I cried and cried on the herringbone patterned bricks at the train depot in Kelso. I have a v-mail he sent to my mom, his sister, dated 1942. He was a belly gunner on the B-17’s that were flying the area where Rommel was fighting. He brought my sis and I back little leather suitcases, tooled in wonderful designs by a skilled artist somewhere in the orient. I still have it. A treasure.
Grover Cleveland Franklin: My suave uncle, joined the Navy in WWII and became a deep sea diver. The kind that wore those heavy suits with the big glass bubble head. He helped detect and destroy mines around battleships. In doing that brave work he lost his hearing and came home as a lip reader for most of my childhood. I was always a bit suspicious because he seemed to read lips so well. He even got written up in the newspaper because he could sing while putting his hands on a phonograph and feeling the vibrations of the music he couldn’t hear. We kids would always try to make loud noise behind him but he never once reacted to it.
Many years later I learned that he confessed that his hearing had gradually came back. He was a hero nevertheless.
About their names: Both being born in North Carolina, back in the 1920’s it was common practice among the country folk to name sons after famous people. I also have another distant relative named George Washington Franklin. I love having hillbilly DNA.
May 26, 2025
May 26, 2025 at 6:28 PM UTC
Peter was my hero, and Wendy my first fanciful lust.
We fought villainous pirates and bloodthirsty injuns,
and when danger came near as a dark scary night
we'd grasp just one happy thought and fly away
to a brighter new day, dreamed just for us.
Such a wondrous thing, the gift of flight.
Free, unrestrained... racing the laughing crows.
It seemed so simple I just had to try,
strange how the impossible, is so attainable
within the mind of a child of five.
I turn the old phonograph way up loud,
climb upon the hassock, (added height for takeoff)
I closed my eyes intense on my one happy thought
and singing the refrain to inspire me...
"You can fly, You can fly, You can fly."
I leap...
And for barely an instant in time I really do feel the sky.
Then gravity's reality crashes me hard to the floor.
Just in time to hear them laughing,
my evil older brothers watching at the door.
They had a great time with their haughty jest
I still hear of it today, but that's OK.
We were just kids and they lacked understanding.
For I was in training; practice for a not too distant date.
Honing my inner mind to create the improbable,
even the impossible, making it all seem real.
Today the refrain is no longer needed,
nor the hassock upon which to stand.
With old age comes a far grander experience.
Leaving all trials and tribulations upon the ground
I sit back, close my eyes, silence the world around.
Reaching out with sure confidence for the sky
with that child of five's, unrestrained inner eye.
Thanks to Peter and Wendy and my early lust
those heckling crows are left far behind
in vapor trails of my receding dust.
*"I can fly, I can fly
I really can fly!"*
© S.Loeding
All Rights Reserved
Nov 6, 2015
Nov 6, 2015 at 2:43 PM UTC
I would love to learn how to waltz before I die
because that will make my dance into the ocean
that much more unbelievable, remarkable, dramatic.
I'll be most endearing as I move against the tide twirling with oxygen
as my beautiful partner; she acts with finesse and is unbending in the moonlight,
predicting my next moves and graces into the ice cold dark of the sea.
The water is soft and encouraging at first, supporting my moves without question.
As it deepens to my legs then chest then chin it fights my gentle rhythms with ferocity
Oxygen keeps dancing on the surface. Why won't she keep dancing with me?
She bids me àdieu rather harshly as my head finally goes under,
and the music blaring from my phonograph on the shore is drowned out.
I hear the rushing of a billion bubbles, yet my open eyes see only black.
What was once a dance is now a march without beat as I continue ahead
the iron shackles I wrapped my legs with seem to be the only glint of light
in the shades of blue that ought to be black that envelope all of my sight.
When the music died my will to ended as well.
I want nothing more than to drink tea on my patio
my record player off the shore and near to me.
I wretch and I turn, my eyes set direct on the surface
where I see the moon filled to brimming with jade milk.
I reach to the greened moon, but never come back up.
Mar 10, 2012
Mar 10, 2012 at 11:58 AM UTC
Cross legged and blank-faced
I sit and wait
Flowers swaying in the wind
The sun shining in my face
Music and laughter play in my ears
A phonograph for things that I don’t feel
Dancing images all around me
Skirts twirling, feet jumping
I used to jump and twirl
I think
Before I finally sat down
Staring farther than they can see
I just knew
Bombs fall all around me
Earth splaying in clumps
Waiting for someone to find me
I sit and wait
Cross legged and blank faced
Oct 11, 2013
Oct 11, 2013 at 1:44 AM UTC
I slip sideways through time
I stop, I rewind
I replay the memories
archived in my mind
blank eyes for projection
the film turns the reel
white noise from a record's
the soundtrack I feel
as my phonograph turns
with the grace of years past
obsolete in it's glory
but I hold on fast
the swell of the symphony
thunders through bone
memories flood through me
of the joys I have known
of loves I have lost
battles hard won
scars I wear proudly
scars that I shun
of days filled with sunshine
and companions long gone
that I still think of fondly
though my life carries on
I'll catalog each image
archive each find
as I sift through the memories
press stop and rewind
Sep 15, 2012
Sep 15, 2012 at 3:48 AM UTC