Cathode Poems | Examples

Dead Station of Soul V2

Dead station of soul, cold
a cuneiform of heavenly hosts 
on a cathode ray tube, born
shadows of forgotten sliver gods roam
digital tears, a broken modem's wail, fear
the hollow shell of the sky, cracking 
nightshade fingernails fawn
lost in the echo chamber
waiting for a mechanical dawn

Royal Ocelot Island

    Raft branch buoyed in canopy crossroad 
    Ocelot pillow paws rail rainforest rotunda 
    Yataghan claws trail trunk, track cathode
    Assailant arouse pounces, stiff tail rudder
    Lithe, while night looms, lightspeed silent


    Ogling exotic shores - she yanks anchor
    Centipede nimble Queen needs her tiara 
    Evermore adorned, baubles bean arabica 
    Lustrous pearl dozes on dark décolletage
    Opulent moon mother of tides, sly tyrant
    Tortures subordinates to claim her island
  

    Iridescent iris treasure hunt sailor ocelot 
    Spotted sea captain keeps snake for halo
    Lapis lazuli exclusively steers royal yacht
    Asphyxiating prey, Casper crouch lay low
    Navigating her way to throne, puss pirate 
    Drapes cashmere ears in conquest crown




         Nautical Nineteenth November

Our World as seniors

Our World as seniors

My world has become one of the impossible,
where the impossible may become possible.

My world has become one of fantasy,
fantasies that becomes ones reality.

Reality where ones limited imagination,
combined with visions, artistry and talent

take ones existence, one’s mind into realms,
beyond that of this world, our reality

and into to the ether world of ones dreams
ones desires, forcing one from facing reality

beyond that projected from a cathode ray tube,
such as wick 1, 2, 3, 4 which lite up my hours.

B. J. “A ” 2
March 27th, 2024

Anti-Poem - Dry Ice and Cologne

a blue chevy impala basks in a suburban driveway
like a beached whale it oozes gases and black oils 
its seeping white walls beg for rubber movements
little boy inside the house sits on a pleated couch
he watches the setting sun through a screen door
fat mother stirs pudding in a wall-papered kitchen
smoking father works a tv guide crossword puzzle
he flicks white hot dust into a crystal glass ashtray
the corner television set transmits black and white
cathode rays of a half-naked wrestler pinned down
the destroyer with mask on lifts his victorious arms

little boy hears calliope music in the green distance
the ice cream man comes with dry ice and cologne 
still three blocks away he makes another long stop
fat mother fries bloody meats in a fiery blue skillet 
she turns on boss radio to hear elvis sing the blues
little boy goes to the admiral and turns the channel
bishop sheen appears in black cursing the darkness
skipper frank implores the kids to brush after meals
tennessee tuxedo chases tiger tornado to megapolis
smoking father finishes a tv guide crossword puzzle
the ice cream man arrives with dry ice and cologne

So Close Yet So Far Away

Us meeting it was by chance - a happenstance
a crowded place, me sitting absorbed in the cathode ray blue of my phone
you sit a close distance away
"you like the show?... It's my favorite"
never again thought I could be this 
i'm drawn to you more and more each day
the sun rises and sets over you - every day I wish it to be longer than the last so I can spend more time with you 
my light do not leave me -I carry you wherever I go
do not leave this door open, for it's a chance our love could walk away

Chambered

Deep in coiled chambered hearts 
mortal designs conspire 
in arcane chamber hearts
pump isometric drugs 
the cathode ray desires
as electric images expire 
what are the strange 
things that toil in the Dark 
idle thoughts and brittle bones conspire 
like ancient snow graced by divinities 
of apathy in oblivion 
cast in shards of cruel inner demons 
accessing cathartic chambered hearts 
pump isometric drugs as photons collide 
reside as something coils 
in mortal minds deep chambered hearts 
as electric image expire!

Rhythm Under the World Ii

Surrender to the rhythm
under the world!

The night music of ages

Dance the Dance Macabre

Clubs deep bass seeps

Into Dark corners 
as the lunar keeps the time!

Electric lights keep the rhythm 
under the world…

Absent images in cathode 
rayed tubes keep the thump and hum…

The feet move to the groove 

The pulse of a heartbeat 
in ascends in rhythm and rhyme 
to a world beyond worlds…

Divine!

A never-were that never was a 
Neverland…

Nevermore! 

Keep in metronome march.
The ruthless ragged raging rhythm.

In the earth under the currents of life
dance the Divinities, the dance Macabre!

Of the world within, and the world without surrender to…

The rhythm and rage 
of the metronomes grace!

The rhythm under the world…

Metropolis Ii of Iii

Haunted by its simplistically,
All the masses work for nothing, 
Power drones I watch the meek alone.
Bare white the afterglow.

Power of blackened glass reaching for the zenith.
To touch the face of creation.
The masses must toil as I do in this Leviathan. 
A Silicon made oblivion.
Thump and hum,
Cold white light in these aged eyes,

Once sky blue now blind in my inner mind.
Now only the passing stare she dares, 
I hear the data in the cathode-ray tubes scream,
Cold is this light, I watch it fall in oblique patterns.

On the pavement of a city ordered in chaos. 
I feel this thump and hum deep in my soul.
The shadow hangs there,
I see rays of an abandoned SON…

TO BE CONTINUED...

Cathode

The past dreaming 
of the future 
Burnt out at last
Light pulsing into the cathode ray tubes 
the wires of difference machines 
process seconds, data, imagery 
From diseased 
To hidden desire that fire electric nights
Shallow dreams what will be 
Pass through nightmares of futures run
in future life the past is in reruns 
As I dream a dream of nothing 
that will last 
A desire of the cold fire burning down deep 
the drink of sleep 
the coiled hard machines 
Stand as the cold winds burn
something reeks of madness and suffering 
the quest of the minds
Inner eye
the nighttime runs rampant in time
with lives burning out fast 
as the passage of time only sees the future as a pulse in Cathoray tubes

Of Some Mad American Empire Ii

A reapers machine
hot white harvest 
bone dry land
years have been spent 
driving this reapers machine 
Across desolate lands
Shifting oblivion sands 
Of some mad American empire
Insanity conspires in dreams dark 
stark towers reach 
reaching into the open sky 
as ravens gather 
black as murder 
On top of empirical spires
Burnt out in sapphire sky 
a reapers machine 
dead at last 
frozen rusted stance 
Heliosphere novas brake 
on shattered glass 
shines bright glittering sun rays
Across the dry façade
Stardust fades into 
blurry Dark rage 
a machine built 
on the damned
The last slaves of Cathode-rays 
In distant insane plains
Ominous clouds gather
Flickering lighting 
Deep rumbling thunder 
Coming insane 
Tyrannical summer dry rains 
Hover over mountain ranges 
Like spines bare of flesh 
hot White Sands 
bone white days 
years has come to pass 
as machines dwell
On plantation lands
derelict sterile 
In these brutal times
of American madness
empires dream
Of a Reapers machine
As they scream
lost in some mad American empire

Razored Heart Ii

I saw the bloody ending
My generation destroyed
My heart wrapped in razor wire
How I mourned their dramatic demise.
Down, down, down into the darkness of this obscure House,
Gently it goes 
Sanguineous
Righteous 
Whores of my Babylon
In my blinding pale yellow light
I see my soul my razored
I look at the faint glimmering
Down, down, down into the darkness
of an obsolete House
Gently it goes 
The vignettes play
The light stays in absence rhythms
A fearful Generation
The neon and cathode rays blinding 
Head long into that good night 
Nothing in the finding 
I saw the bloody ending
Generations from now
Tangled in my razored heart

Galvanic Cell

It all starts off at the anode,
where the electrons are lost,
they went bumping and shooting through the wire
and set the voltmeter on fire. 
There's a huge crash-land in the cathode,
where the cations are reduced,
then the anions sprinted back through the salt bridge,
and electricity is produced.

Cathode Afterlife

The joyous song and dance man

--- deceased and buried in the 1980s ---

suddenly now on the tv screen

in one of his old movies,

tripping "the light fantastic"

across the tap dance limelight stage.

Ars longo, vita brevis.*



A Latin translation of Hippocrates' aphorism from its original Greek, often translated as meaning "Art is long, life is short".

60's Child

60's Child

I found myself at the tail end of childhood then,
Coming out of its long sunny sleep;
The days and nights of pleasures, terrors, wonders
Strung together to make up the pitted landscape
Of being small
Still filled my world and made it whole.

Mostly i remember things like:
Summer crab feasts, "I Love Lucy" reruns
"Laugh-In" bits, the drone of ball games on t.v.,
Trips into town to my Grandfather's old store
For candy and comics
Back before my town became Yuppie Central.

Another child raised beneath the cathode rays' glow,
My mind absorbed images, words with only hinted meanings
- Like the smiling faces in the cigarette ads
The offhand reports of body counts
From a faraway, makebelive war,

i heard and felt the many signs of strain
Between the longhaired Bigger Kids and their parents; 
But not for me their world of confused revolt.
That would come later, milder in my case
When I became one of their second, weaker, wave.

No, I stepped out of the close land of childhood
Just after it was all over;
Wondering ever since,
Just what it was I'd missed, or hadn't 
By dint of being a kid of the fabled 60's.

She Finally Lets Down Her Guard

She turns on the tv:

Death smiles back at her again,

Cannily, comfortably.



The face of the so-called expert on the tv screen

Suddenly breaks into a ferral canine smile.

He is momentarily bug-eyed,

His tongue lolls

As he laughs along with his fellow so-called

Experts appearing on the warmongering, corporate, 

Mainstream, so-called news-gabfest panel.

In another world, it would, just as easily, be me there,

Would, just as easily, be almost anyone,

Instead of this all-too human man,

Shamelessly running, for cash and fame, pitfalls against

Humanity, through deadly cathode trees

Invisible for the deadly cathode forest.

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