Short Apothecary Poems

on endless summer days
   winter's feeble sun

 apothecary of toxic tinctures
   phantom of the night...

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John Keats qualified as a surgeon apothecary
before concocting his poetry
He also wrote ballads & odes
but sonnets were his  favourite mode...

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Another episode with the hope to marry
for a heart, a client to the apothecary
joy was their musician
with nice dances so Indian
he walks out leaving nothing for her to carry....

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I speak of cash crops, refined 
apothecary powders (staples really) bought to
sate, to feed the scarred artery and the
diseased mind, the lover and the slave.
I speak of madness....

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Jean Neuhaus had an apothecary store in Brussels.
He started covering medicines with chocolate, to make it more palatable.
His grandson replaced the medicine with praline.
“a spoonful of sugar”...

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Let's go to the apothecary shop
  -- Ah, it's closed over the noon hour
We'll stop by the milliner then 
  -- I see. It's closed then too...

I guess we'll just be forced to play
'Peek-a-Boo' at the Local Loo...

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I need serotonin so serenade me
Let me slip away into a soft dream sleeping soundly , crossing the threshold of your apothecary
You're my medicine
Be my Sunday afternoon in the sun warmed spot on the bed
My safest space 

...

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It hurts when I breathe
The pain within my chest
Burns with every breath
Are my lungs but even left?

Is the art of the apothecary 
Any solution of mine pest
Tis a cause of melancholy 
My own life is my distress.

Oh, draft of heaven 
Fill my gasping lest
I expire within thy being
Never knowing my purpose....

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It hurts when I breathe
The pain within my chest
Burns with every breath
Are my lungs but even left?
Is the art of the apothecary
Any solution of mine pest
Tis a cause of melancholy
My own life is my distress.
Oh, draft of heaven singing
Fill my gasping lest
I expire within thy being
Never knowing my purpose best
Copyright © ANDREA TRAVIS...

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In 1745, the apothecary

Time stands still, peering at the past

The chemists lived making potions

Between dust and rats

Gadgets like compasses hung

Amidst glass vials and bronze knobs

Keys to hidden compartments

Silver ladles and candelabras

Joseph Black isolates CO2

An odd phenomena of “fixed air.”

The healers of the early ages

The fearful labelled witches

And, often then burned...

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She was glass,
apothecary blue,
potions cool within,
a cure of sorts.
  Some who sipped
survived
and some did not.
Some whose 
burning lips
relinquished,
  quenched
their thirst
forever,
never to desire 
her fire
again.
and then,
there was 
i
was there
parched beyond
regret.
afraid and yet
obsession
drove me
on to 
shatter all 
for that last 
drop,
the drop that 
fell,
that fell so fast...
and she was
glass....

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Let your words come like leeches
sucking bad blood from the body
of my work. Swell with pride
excising disturbing humors.
Ill, I have come, and arm-bare,
begging to be saved.
Open a vein, young apothecary.
There is plenty of humor to spare.
I do not mind the mending knife,
the fire of its kiss only brightens my chances of living.
I do not mind the gluttony of innocent words
as they draw away the poison.
Fever throbs in my ears.
Cure me....

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Apothecary of fate
Mix me well 
Mix me a wishing well
Make me one so strong 
A wonderful blend
Fill it with all kinds of bends 
Got so much to say 
I will buy in 
Keep you around 
Just keep going on 
Make the road long 
Just set the hook and pull puck
I will come back
Again and again 
Set the hook reel me in 
Just make me with a kiss
Troubles with bliss
Oh apothecary can you do this
I will give you all I got to give
Leave a trail to prove I lived
Apothecary just do it...

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