Carol Dorf

The Zero—Taught Us—Phosphorus

Taught by zeros           

            she handled

                        Phosphorus

made her bed

            on the periodic table—

desperate

            for structure

                        to organize time's

                                    glacial epochs

She found power

            in contained

                        explosions

and in the contrary—

            elements that resisted

                        fire's reactive

                                    intentions—

first red, then blue flicker, to white

This paralysis

            bloomed into

                        "vital energies."

Liminal

Corridors
                        as twisted as capillaries

Somewhere a headlamp

                                    casts

                                                networks of shadows

 
Halls of obsolete machines

                        grave torpedoes

                                    Astrolabes;

            fluroscopes

                        to find the bones of the feet

                                     through shoes, flesh;

            typewriters appeal,

                        to the young

                                    like calligraphy tools

                                                 butterchurns

                                                            whalebone corsets

Otherness of another world's

                                                tools

                                                            toys