"phosphorous" poems
To Ezra Pound
These are the names of the companies that have made
money from this war
nineteenhundredsixtyeight Annodomini fourthousand
eighty Hebraic
These are the Corporations who have profited by merchan-
dising skinburning phosphorous or shells fragmented
to thousands of fleshpiercing needles
and here listed money millions gained by each combine for
manufacture
and here are gains numbered, index'd swelling a decade, set
in order,
here named the Fathers in office in these industries, tele-
phones directing finance,
names of directors, makers of fates, and the names of the
stockholders of these destined Aggregates,
and here are the names of their ambassadors to the Capital,
representatives to legislature, those who sit drinking
in hotel lobbies to persuade,
and separate listed, those who drop Amphetamine with
military, gossip, argue, and persuade
suggesting policy naming language proposing strategy, this
done for fee as ambassadors to Pentagon, consul-
tants to military, paid by their industry:
and these are the names of the generals & captains mili-
tary, who know thus work for war goods manufactur-
ers;
and above these, listed, the names of the banks, combines,
investment trusts that control these industries:
and these are the names of the newspapers owned by these
banks
and these are the names of the airstations owned by these
combines;
and these are the numbers of thousands of citizens em-
ployed by these businesses named;
and the beginning of this accounting is 1958 and the end
1968, that static be contained in orderly mind,
coherent and definite,
and the first form of this litany begun first day December
1967 furthers this poem of these States.
December 1, 1967
3.8k
bugs and little blue stars
crawl from my eye sockets-
they hiss and pop in the light
and burn my transparent flesh.
glow like phosphorous.
grow like weeds.
bend like my spine.
you are not
permanent.
you will float off
on shiny orbs of soulless
plastic. helium smile,
chrysanthemum hands.
Oct 22, 2012
Oct 22, 2012 at 11:52 PM UTC
I was a zygote swimming in a pool of natural
Energy, just right for the formation of life.
We were all just so, had there been chemistry?
Had there even been a magical mystery to this
Formation of the being, their biological clocks
Ticking against the backdrop of evolutionary Zion
Time, the want of stepping outside oneself, knowing?
This is that zygote, it's chemistry a part of all things,
All creations of this world, the same as this solar system,
Comprised of all of the natural energy that was formed
So many billions of years ago, just like a nucleus presence,
A fire...sparked by other star kindling, a mystery indeed...
Without any solid chemical biology of science.
In the human body? Oxygen, Hydrogen, Carbon, Nitrogen,
Calcium Phosphorous, and in the sun? Hydrogen, Nitrogen,
Yes even Oxygen, as well as Carbon. I think you see that
There is a valid connection.
Apr 30, 2015
Apr 30, 2015 at 2:40 PM UTC
689
The Zeroes—taught us—Phosphorous—
We learned to like the Fire
By playing Glaciers—when a Boy—
And Tinder—guessed—by power
Of Opposite—to balance Odd—
If White—a Red—must be!
Paralysis—our Primer—dumb—
Unto Vitality!
2.3k
by
rgpage
I never cried in viet nam,
I just seemed to take it in.
The missing limbs and twisted flesh
friends one day and gone the next.
Was I too young to understand?
And need someone to take my hand?
No mother there to hold my hand
no father there to teach me ways.
To lead me through the day by days.
Just left alone, and alone I stayed
Instead I found my bottle friend
to stay my tears and hide my fears.
Back then “charley” felt they owned the night.
With blusterous thud the mortars hit,
Of saying hi it was “charley’s” way
then to be my friend by day.
From no where came the dragon ship,
and tipping his left wing
as a polite executioner saluting his victim just before unleashing hell.
W/ firery tongue lapping up the earth while mini-guns
roared, eagerly devouring all living things,
leaving “charley” w/ no where to run.
All clear, a small visit w/ my bottle friend
and back to sleep in the alcohol deep.
I was no John Wayne, I didn’t fight the war
a target yes for “charley’s” sights
when the sun gave way to night.
But no, I didn’t fight.
I never cried glossary:
Charley=VC=viet cong=enemy: by day he acted like any of the population, some were even employed around the various bases. But at sundown he would turn…
Dragonship=C-47=2 or 3 several barreled mini-guns mounted on left side of the plane capable of firing a few 1000 rounds per minute each w/ a phosphorous round placed at every 6th round a tracer. At night this made it look like a steady stream of fire coming from the plane, hence the name “dragon ship” or “puff the magic dragon.” To aim the pilot had to dip his left wing and fly in a counter clock wise fashion. Very effective weapon…
Written for a special friend A.S.
Apr 26, 2013
Apr 26, 2013 at 12:00 PM UTC
*Fishing off Puffin Island as a boy
By Jude Kyrie
I remember back to my boyhood
it was a different place in time.
The little aluminum fishing boat.
Its ancient Johnson outboard motor.
leaving a wake splitting the calm Irish sea
off the coast of Anglesey in North Wales.
My grandfather lived his retirement
years out in the small fishing village.
We reach Puffin Island
a deserted rock of land full of nesting puffins
The anchor tossed over into the deep waters
of the Irish sea.
We dropped our lines in the water and waited.
The heavy lines tripple baited in anticipation
of a healthy dinner catch.
The schools of Mackerel
attacked our bait
We were tired of pulling them into the boat.
My grandfather slitting the bellies
and cleaning them throwing the guts
back into the sea that bred them.
Hungry fish clamored for the feed.
nothing left for waste.
I held a spluttering Storm light
to pierce the blackness of the night.
My fear of a giant shark
attack filled my young heart.
we packed our catch and the propeller
creating a phosphorous wake behind us.
I marveled at the multitudes of species
below my feet.
And at the untamed violence and beauty of life
that we all shared on this wonderful planet.
And then back into darkness.
The total black darkness.*
May 13, 2016
May 13, 2016 at 12:25 PM UTC
She subsists in the cosmos of glamour.
Her eyes twinkle and eyelashes jiggle within the veil of the darkening mascara.
Her body glistens like the presence of phosphorous
Igniting the hearts for her swains.
She is among the stars synthesizing us to be powerless of reaching.
Her body moves like a mermaid pretending herself to be exclusive.
Her lips flutter words those are meant to be listened with sheer fascination,
and cannot be agitated.
Reigning her world she pretends herself to be the empress.
She makes, as well as breaks the hearts of a million,
Forbidding them to remonstrate.
She trends among the unknown with her charming attire- She is the moon.
Carried away by fame she shines,
Under her spell the hearts get enchanted too soon.
Mar 16, 2011
Mar 16, 2011 at 8:16 AM UTC
Blow, Lyceum grasses, blow,
From coiled lips of your wolf-god Apollo
Whose dawn-padded paws to starprints roam
This temple-tribute to thought-illumined roads.
Blow, Lyceum grasses, blow
Of wave upon wave of your brushings-by,
From staff to sandal-fall to cloak hemline,
For rhapsodes, your song-odyssey to sew.
The Greeks built the sun,
Upon scaffolding~acrobaticon~
With pear-skinned lightness to glow,
Or like leavened bread from the woodburning stove.
Blow, Lyceum grasses, blow,
The sun lies old on its famine-cracked pillow,
In spittle of gold and yellowed phosphorous,
With the gods past-blown to ruin.
May 25, 2019
May 25, 2019 at 11:00 PM UTC
Around 93 million miles from darling precious mother Earth,
First appeared glory sun,
In ecliptic stroll,
She'll orbit through her universe,
Dances past Mercury,
Stops for no party,
Cos this planet's party's lacking atmosphere,
Scally-wag sun scoots by Venus,
Burning hot herself,
Shining brightly in the darkness,
Phosphorescent glow,
Hesperus, the evening star, first one to be seen at night,
Phosphorous the morning star, the last planet to bid us goodnight,
When the morning comes in sight
Our lady home is next in line,
A planet rich with all life's treasures,
Mars she sits quietly dressed in red,
Has no water, not sure if she's always been dead,
Jupiter, has severe acne, shown in one red spot immense, she has no atmosphere, what gas she has is toxic, ammonia, methane, hydrogen,
The biggest baby of them all,
Saturn wears no wedding rings, has bands of ice particulate skirting round it's girth,
Uranus not much to say, he hangs around in space all day, as the Greek God of the sky,
Watching as the other world's go by,
Neptune, Roman God of the seas in planet form,
Pluto, chilled, the coldest one of all.
I hope you enjoyed this, it was extremely hard to write!!
By ladylivvi1
© 2013 ladylivvi1 (All rights reserved)
Jul 2, 2013
Jul 2, 2013 at 4:00 PM UTC
A white abstract silence falls heavily like phosphorous snow… odd and oblique with nervous intensity of random limitations… sensitive and fragile in its unremitting generosity…A fluency of motion of imaginary realisation in silent turbulence descends in tenebrous shadows of illusion detonating the unconscious… the symmetry and exactitude of silence beyond all compass…. an intricate camouflage… meticulous and consistent.
Disinherited it tries to sanctify the air….. a silence in where stars evaporate vibrational loud and inquisitive…. freezing time by the velocity of its inner momentum of silent adrenalin.
Concealing its true identity isolating me in unknown realisation of what is to occur.. It resonates with constant tension waiting for unpredictability’s of indispensible voices that don’t speak….. This is a realisation of the imagination…. a vibrant insensibility…. density of unravelled thoughts that vaporise within me causing a vibration that fractures the equation of time and space in the burning crucible of my mind.
Intractable proportions of silent thought…. hovering… a constant mirage of irrational calculations….. This silence forces all the tears of consequence to fall upon my face with no avail…..Then in this thunderous silence see graffiti on white walls…abstract and meaningless….Like primitive lives…those with meaning yet possess no meaning… an ungovernable democracy of fruitless endeavour… of non factual fastidiousness… a glimpse of life and its fallacy.
Yet the words were spoken and written… by whom… And for why.. Now the silence punctuates and instructs…. phosphorous extinguishes itself and hides behind another truth…..The noise of the world cascades in torrents deafening… attempting to defeat… subordinate the senses in atavistic cruelty… Prowling searching for the silence… but it has gone…. disappeared in the imagination of my inner self…. an abstraction I call me….. But I know where the silence has gone….
Mar 22, 2012
Mar 22, 2012 at 7:07 PM UTC
Gentle plutonium flows through
a cloud soaked sky.
The next breath is
somewhere
in the air all around me.
I cannot catch it
I inhale the scent of a city
to exhale the circular lengths
of lost civilizations held together
by faceless, mindless tycoons
and machine-gun fire.
Like the phosphorous spark
of distant fireflies,
words stirring like chemicals
to flash in unison.
So what is this now?
A cerulean tempo limited alone
by the accidental pausing
of an instant?
Stutter of the clock.
or these hidden iron
beats hammering rhythms
into my soiled heart.
Touch of an infinity
blood flow
with a pinch of glassy
thoughts that dwell on stilts over
a sea of miniature gods and
hourglasses and TV sets and
suicide beds.
Streetlights in the
windows talk
but do not offer a final
answer.
Jul 6, 2014
Jul 6, 2014 at 10:13 PM UTC
1598
Who is it seeks my Pillow Nights—
With plain inspecting face—
“Did you” or “Did you not,” to ask—
’Tis “Conscience”—Childhood’s Nurse—
With Martial Hand she strokes the Hair
Upon my wincing Head—
“All” Rogues “shall have their part in” what—
The Phosphorous of God—
1.5k
Epiphany from the Berry Fields
You would not come with me
through constellations of Jack-in-the-Pulpit,
your reasons shrouded in obscurity.
I went there once to pray ---
Did I tell you? ---
I spied a grey squirrel
gnawing a cherished butternut
in a fury of drunken hunger;
forgot at once my prayers.
You went instead, alone,
to the Kingdom of the Mushroom.
I sealed my mouth
afraid to enter there.
You saw violent phosphorous rivers and
vivid galloping colors,
that were of mystical internal origin.
We might have eaten
vine-ripe strawberries and
drunk cold mountain water,
that gushed from the mouth of
the cave under the cliff.
Perhaps, like me you were afraid,
terrified by florid fields and familiar female.
How sad ---
Sometimes I am so dense ---
I should have told you,
*I went there in the distance
as a girl.*
Coincidental Drift
Through the airport window pane,
isolated, I watched the jet
traverse the field in silent shimmering motion.
My vagrant gaze remained
fixed upon the infinite horizon
long after the shadowy
plane had passed from view.
This seemed to me to parallel
my motionless furtive feelings,
as after one I've loved
has migrated in another season.
It was not long after this
that she re-entered the room,
bathed in the murmur of
alluring fragrance which
quickly drew my mind from
the solitude of thought to
a sensual appreciation of her perfume.
How easily she drew my mind astray
from pleasant thought of you and yesterday.
I recalled how earlier this morning,
as she lay neither asleep, nor awake,
but somewhere in between,
I had tried to touch her outstretched hand,
yet, uncannily she had withdrawn it.
The smoke that wafted above our bed then
was the only pervading reality and
not the Mona Lisa smile on her face,
nor the emptiness of my longing hand.
She's said, *She's ready ---
--- that her bags are packed ---
and shouldn't we be going?*
Yes, Yes I suppose it's time.
And a wind howling in my brain recalled,
I'd either been here once before or
seen it etched upon an empty sky.
Feb 27, 2012
Feb 27, 2012 at 9:47 PM UTC
a poem for the presumed dead, French Hostage, Denis Allex
An unmapped forest
grew upon chin
and cheek;
3 years in the making,
the no shaving,
helped to grow by
his tears from his crying.
Orange, orange,
orange again jumpsuit,
prisoner in the arms
of those whom shoot-
not to wound, but fire
with the intent to surround
and then to
close in
to cap a bullet for the ****
Fire flares into the night
so phosphorous full
stops hail down, and on
the floor in front of the believers,
a paragraph shall form, with perfectly
placed punctuation;
detailing and listing
why they plucked this man
from a French farmhouse village,
and let him grow young,
in fear,
in this far, middle eastern haven.
Jan 13, 2013
Jan 13, 2013 at 12:07 PM UTC
~~~¡>¡<¡~~~
*chrystophaise beauty
amorphous
night
phosphorous
lanterns
creating your
light
feather'd antenni
soft golden
eyes
a fairie
a wraith
a mask of
disguise
animate jewel
gently you
swoon
sentient sweetness
breath of the
moon
in the
somnbulent
silence
you
sing
exquisite
Luna moth
TRANCE
on the
WING*
soulsurvivor
6/14/2015
Jun 15, 2015
Jun 15, 2015 at 1:51 AM UTC
there is a
circle of chalk
in my chilly box of
closed door
cacophony
coughs cigarettes cries cars
it is as big as i am
and i draw it daily
to be nightlight
phosphorous
in the darkening unity of
self and breath
self and breath
self and breath
within
without.
Jan 16, 2012
Jan 16, 2012 at 6:04 PM UTC
The car was running smoothly.
Rattling
Underneath me
Were waves of jades and phosphorous
Blues tickling my imagination,
Urging me to forget the day spent toiling.
Pushing memories away from myself,
A mustard stained cloud
Shouted rays of white down through my windshield.
Fluttering eyelash wings shook
Hastily over blood-shot pupils hot from a knot
Deep in my stomach, my back, my thighs.
Below me, the bridge continued to rattle.
Off over and through the tunneled vision of commerce,
Questions arose in me that I could not answer.
Answers are remedies to an illness called "Why?"
Being free to live is a very hard thing to come by
Leaves only achieve freedom for a moment:
The stem thins
The stem breaks
The leaf drifts in
Angelic joy and indifference,
Plummeting towards a destination
They know not of or care.
Lo', the leaf, soon enough,
Reaches the place
They were always destined to be
I turn into the driveway
The lights are off inside
I sit in the car a moment
And push the memories farther way
To say to do or to lean on say
Is a very dangerous game to play
People expect what they pay for
And even after that
They will, the next time, be expecting more
Our flesh has been on this Earth a long time
Being our home, we are surrounded by our own kind
I play in the mazes of unbalanced theories of truth
Cheeks bleeding with mother Theresa searching for her tooth
And here, in the pit of all this time and space
My age tells me that living is not a race
The finish line is there and has been there
For every man and woman of every age
I swallow a bitter bite of the thin cold air
Reading through the mist:
Life is far harder when forced to care
Jun 12, 2013
Jun 12, 2013 at 2:49 AM UTC
Got a condition
Under my skin
Ain't going to be solved
With simple addition
These days are short
These hours are long
I'm whispering to myself
In a tune of a song
Here comes Greg the gong
Standing straight as he cracks his knuckles
His face his old, his robes are grey
He tells me, "Your stomach looks like it's about to buckle."
Outside the cafe
We sip on coffee and biscuits
Looking at a world
Caught up in its own mischief
Lies are spread thin
Truth a little thinner
Then, we see something move
Behind the building of the barber
We go to look and later on
Wished we were a little smarter
We saw
A rock painted in blood
An eye inside of a glove
I nod my head and Greg tries to say,
"Death is a caught fish in a stream far away."
The night fell like an anvil
Onto my sagging shoulders
I was never taught the rules
So I can't say I've forgotten them
Caught in a fix of my own creation
Where the truth and the lies mix
"There's nothing in this life that is quick"
I nodded my head at him and paid my tip
Catch the break in the pause
"Smells phosphorous," she smiled.
I've travled a thousand miles
But what I've seen
Never amounted to nothing
After I saw her
She was the cat's purr
And the dog's meow
The air behind
The desert winds frown
I'm torn apart
Left for dead
Waiting for that moment
When one become two
Wishing I'd chosen
The other instead
Can't see a way out
The tunnel's caved in
Dynamite went bad
Only darkness around me now
And I'm struggling to breathe
There was no light
No way away from myself
I tried to recall
Everything I'd ever touched
But all I felt was
Soot in my nose
And rocks in my eyes
And then a phrase came to me,
"It was all a big lie."
I died and became
The whistling kettle
Of an unreleased song
By a well-known singer
A whisper whose sound would be better
If shouted by a heated young lover
There is a night
Without vanity or despair
Where life runs free
Without injustice or duty or care
Find that Night
Seek it
Search for it
And take what you were born for
Find the Night
Jan 16, 2013
Jan 16, 2013 at 4:19 PM UTC
You’re constructed out of the same elements
That stars and lionesses and
Even your sister wolves are.
Through your heart pumps star poison!
The very iron in your capillaries
Would destroy something
As extraordinary and enormous as a star.
Your organs are padded with the same
Water that used to carve away
Amazing things like the Grand Canyon,
Your insides are bursting with water
From dissolving meteors- from deeper in space than you know.
Your bones can survive tornadoes,
Hurricanes,
Massive disasters-
And you’re still pulling out your hair and
Tearing at your skin?
You may feel like you have nothing
Left inside your core,
But your heart is still beating, isn’t it?
Your lungs still intake oxygen-
Adept in fueling fires to level entire forests-
Even though all we are is
Carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, iron, and phosphorous.
But men still charge into collapsing fireballs
And mothers still hold their crying children
And clouds still hang in the stratosphere and
You can still make it through this
Because every day is something new.
Mar 27, 2014
Mar 27, 2014 at 1:55 PM UTC
the weight around absence of might
will slowly bury collapsed matter out of
our style
the entrenched wretched waste of verb
is sewn hastily to this fray
out of sight
the pale adventure will pause on a petal
resuming criminal affections of
the retina
one phosphorous bible verse thread
invents one stone knot end
ad infinitum
Mar 13, 2014
Mar 13, 2014 at 6:16 AM UTC
Bored living in the tombs
Those turned to names of cities
Where we live and visit until
Too many of them are carved on stones
Openly standing books
Echoing our names on the bills
Sent by devil or in Dave's name sometimes
Street signs, silent police?
Scary if you know they were those
Underground names now holding posters
Directing you to your tomb home
Until a square-meter palace is sold to you
These revolutionary thinking reformers
Who called themselves gravediggers
All names have to be digged out now 'cause
They are running short of lands to continue
Urbanization. Hear what they say:
You could die eternally but this cemetery
Can only be used for 70 years, legally
Your cinerary caskets will be displayed
In sky-high buildings, closer to the heavens
Lucky if yours is made of sandalwood
Carved and painted as Red Mansion where
You could have wonder-ful dreams
Your friends and enemies could smell
The phosphorous glowing in the wind
Feb 17, 2016
Feb 17, 2016
Feb 17, 2016 at 1:58 AM UTC
i smell the sulfur in my blood
as it drips from my fingernails
onto the ground -
iron returning to iron.
sometimes i think i see
macroscopically
because faces aren’t faces
they’re eyes staring back at me.
i can’t bring myself to look
so i stare at the cracks of their hands -
broken palms moving back and forth
to words i don’t understand.
i see the sky and think of the sea
and wonder if the clouds taste of salt -
but there’s a growing buzz
that sounds like vocal chords being
rubbed against one another
like the shriek of a violin,
so i cast my gaze to my own flesh.
it is beige and soft and strange
and i just want to rip it off
and expand past the atmosphere -
leaving behind calcium and phosphorous.
instead i continue to bite away at myself
and rain red.
Feb 5, 2015
Feb 5, 2015 at 8:28 PM UTC
I hate my body more than the events that define it
I don't want to be ****** as long as you don't touch me it's okay
the sky is dark and I plead for the rain after an infinite drought that causes my stomach to rupture and turns my tears into phosphorous drops only to be ignited by the rampant heavenly downpour
Oh my god is this it I ask openly as I inhale and exhale, slowly enveloping myself in fumes from my ruptured appendix and my crooked spine, growing like a plant that needs guidance to maintain rigidity
How long will it take for them to realize we are just
animals
May 19, 2015
May 19, 2015 at 4:48 PM UTC
A heated room,
sixteen seats beneath the phosphorous shell,
sixteen minds, exactly the same and yet unique.
Between bites of lobster
and the first entree,
one ***** discusses politics,
while the business has chains and crops
on his mind.
The religious fanatics
can't get his hand out of his pants,
and the proud pagan
pays him to keep them there.
We all have an inkling towards one--
our secret,
divulging desire--
what ailment do you prefer?
Oct 17, 2013
Oct 17, 2013 at 3:07 PM UTC
Our love was like
a matchstick in a snowstorm...
...the sizzle snuffed before
the phosphorous flare
was finished
Jan 31, 2011
Jan 31, 2011 at 5:44 PM UTC