somethingdarker | Aug. 2nd, 2012

Aug. 2nd, 2012

Absinthe:
As they sipped from a dwindling supply of absinthe - Abbi Ball "The Big Bang Cycle"

Who slowed the jagged hours with absinthe - Dana Gioia "Tedium"

Alcohol:
A dram of colourless alcohol - Mark Ford "Twenty Twenty Vision"

Alcohol as sweet as honey - Amaud Jamaul Johnson "When Miss Lucy Sings"

Ale.

Ambrosia.

Apertif:
An apertif distilled of wormwood - Jaswinder Bolina "Postcards"

The dreamy seer of Athens and her apertifs - Cynthia Zarin "Ouija Board"

Apple Wine:
Tasting of acid flame and apple wine - Ruth Lechlitner "A Winter's Tale"

Beer.

Bock:
Where flows the whiskey sour or the russet bock - Wallace Irwin "An Inside Con to Refined Guys"

Bourbon:
Borrow luster from a bourbon sun - Timothy Donnelly "The Cloud Corporation"

Brandy:
With a strong fellow feeling for brandy and sherry - L.V.F. Randolph "Mrs. Rabothem's Party" [The Continental Monthly v.4 no.1, July 1863]

Comforting as cherry brandy - Captain Owen Rutter "The Song of Tiadatha"

Brew.

Buttermilk:
All the sweet buttermilk watered the plain - "Kitty of Coleraine" [A Book of Irish Verse ed. by W.B. Yeats]

Churn and buttermilk at once - Aimee Le "So the Love Story Started"

Champagne.

Cherry Brandy:
Comforting as cherry brandy - Captain Owen Rutter "The Song of Tiadatha"

Cider:
A jug of cider on the board - Bliss Carman and Richard Hovey "The Joys of the Road"

Letting Life's cider out - F.W. Harvey "Martha Basin on Marriage"

The brave recurring dream of kingly cider - Theodore Maynard "At Yelverton"

When the cider-stills run amber - Clinton Scollard "Now's the Time o' Year"

Cocktail:
Mixing its cocktail of sadness and dazzle - Kim Addonizio "Darkening Then Brightening"

Caprice and a cocktail shaker - Mary Jo Bang "Time Speeds, Said Louise, When a Fever Rises"

Lacking the fabric of a cocktail - Diane DeCillis "Quiet Rooms"

Cocoa:
A twirl of cocoa nib and bergamot - Yalie Saweda Kamara "Listening to Nina Simone Sing 'Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues'"

White-fruited cocoa shown against the shell - James Whitcombe Riley "An Empty Glove"

Coffee.

Cranberry Wine:
With a surplus of cranberry wine - Dorsey Craft "The women my husband ought to love"

Currant Wine:
More than all my currant wine - Philip Lybbe Powys Lybbe "The Lay of the Sheriff"

Dregs.

Espresso:
Anoint my neck and cheeks with espresso - Matthew Thorburn "This is What the City Smells Like?"

Gin.

Gin and Tonic:
Had their gin and tonic talks - Stephen Yenser "Vertumnal [excerpt]"

Highball:
A highball of history and radio - Russell Brakefield "Field Recordings"

Hot Toddy:
Craving fresh pie and hot toddies - Elizabeth Bradfield "Why They Went"

Juice.

Lees.

Lemonade:
And fountains full of lemonade spout up - Marian Douglas "King and Queens"

Libation:
Spilling libations from the brim - Eleanor Farjeon "Pan-Worship"

Liqueur:
Old liqueurs in leather kegs - Iris Tree "[Many things I'd find to charm you]"

Liquor.

Margarita:
Sipping margaritas from a water bottle - Diannely Antigua "We Never Stop Talking About Our Mothers"

Martini:
After cigarettes and martinis and masks have vanished - Andre F. Peltier "I Definitely Dream in Color"

Mead.

Milk.

Mocha:
Mustard yellow, off-white, and mocha brown - Mouna Ammar "Azulelos of my Grandmother's Hallway"

The dragon orders an iced caramel mocha - Cislyn Smith "Hot"

Moonshine.

Nectar.

Orange Juice:
Orange juice in the form of air - Taije Silverman "Armageddon"

Pekoe:
Forego your redolent draughts of rare Pekoe - Ellen Tracy Alden "A Centennial Tea-Pot"

Plum Wine:
A mouse drunk on plum wine - Michael McGriff "Inversion"

Red Wine:
The cups of red wine turned pale - Mary Coleridge "Unwelcome"

The stain of rich red wine - Eugene A. Davidson "The Swift and Sharp-tongued Flame of Death"

Like red wine and honey - Amy Lowell "A Decade"

With the strong red wine of His mirth - John Masefield "Laugh and Be Merry"

Rum.

Rye Whiskey:
Enough rye whiskey to kill - D.A. Powell "[the cocktail hour finally arrives: whether ending a day at the office]"

Sauterne:
Sauterne and quinine, saccharine and gall - Stephen Vincent Benet "Two More Muses"

Schnapps:
With schnapps and smoke and psalm - Edmund Clarence Stedman "Peter Stuyvesant's New Year's Call: 1 Jan. A.C. 1661"

Scotch:
She has her secret scotch against the cold - Brooke Abbey "How to Adult"

Sherry:
With a strong fellow feeling for brandy and sherry - L.V.F. Randolph "Mrs. Rabothem's Party" [The Continental Monthly v.4 no.1, July 1863]

Strawberry Wine:
Nursing a bottle of strawberry wine - Hilarie Jones "The Teacher"

Tea.

Toast.

Vermouth:
Barnacles of sunshine and vermouth - Maggie Nelson "Vallejo"

Vintage.

Vodka.

Water.

Whiskey.

Whiskey Sour:
Where flows the whiskey sour or the russet bock - Wallace Irwin "An Inside Con to Refined Guys"

Wine.

Navigation Links:
Go to author indices.
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Abbey:
That had eaten the abbey's fruits - G.K. Chesterton "The Secret People"

Airport.

Amphitheater:
Whirl of winds against the amphitheatre of hills - Katherine Hale "Buffalo Meat"

Apartment:
An apartment building of locked jaws - Sahar Muradi "All I can see is nothing"

Entered their apartments at twilight - Maryam Ivette Parhizkar "Women of the 1980s"

The first key flip in an apartment - Chet'la Sebree "An End"

Apiary:
I approach my moon's apiary - Devan Barlow "A Moon Witch at the Party"

Arena:
Even when the arena is empty - Andrea Gibson "In the chemo room, I wear mittens made of ice so I don't lose my fingernails. But I took a risk today to write this down"

absence is the arena of death - Kara Jackson "fleeing"

Aviary:
Exploding from this toxic aviary - Timothy Donnelly "By Night with Torch and Spear"

Bank.

Barbershop see:
Shop.

Barn.

Barrack:
The black hole in the barracks - Seamus Heaney "Singing School: 2. A Constable Calls"

Biodome:
Ice feathers across the biodome - Joanne Merriam "Thirteen Scifaiku for Blackbirds"

Boardinghouse:
Spirits entering a boardinghouse - Tyree Daye "Friday Night on the Hill"

Bookstore:
Standing hushed in the aisles of bookstores - Allison Joseph "Notebooks"

Booth:
The window inside of a confessional booth - Aaron Tyler Hand "Self-Portrait as Combinations Taco Bell/Pizza Hut/KFC"

The Fair of Vanity has many a Booth - Wallace Irwin "The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám Jr."

Double rows of bartering booths - Amy Lowell "Market Day"

Bridge.

Brothel:
Cries in a haunted brothel - Sandy Florian "Phonograph"

Brownstone:
A brownstone for hummingbirds - francine j. harris "Wetland"

Bungalow:
The red sun eats the bungalows - Eve L. Ewing "I come from the fire city"

Cabin:
Cabins on either side of an hour - Mary Jo Bang "In November We Inched Closer"

Cannery:
Double agents in the cannery - Jaswinder Bolina "Stump Speech"

Casino:
In an abandoned casino - Lawrence Ferlinghetti "Autobiography"

Castle.

Cathedral.

Chapel:
The silent chapel of a pine forest in winter - Shutta Crum "No Mansions for Me"

The basilisk of the Steadfast Chapel - Enheduana "Temple Hymns: 16. E-Ana, the Temple of Inana in Uruk" transl. by Sophus Helle

While she dreams of chapel bells - Jennifer Key "Rich People in Paintings,"

Near its stones and chapel doors - Jon Pineda "Cinque Terre"

Chateau:
Chateaus where mammoth Queens once ruled - Ed Lynskey "Mrs. Lincoln's Terror of Moths"

Church.

Cinema.

Citadel.

Clock Tower:
Whirling high, from the Clock Tower to the sky - William Manning "A Child's Dream of the Zoo"

Cloister.

Convent:
Within the Convent of the Past - Annie Fellows Johnston "Retrospection"

Coop:
Of raids on the pantry and hen-coop - Lucy Larcom "The Cat's Questions" [Fun and Frolic. No date. Edited by E.T. Roe.]

Cot:
Pauper's cot and hall of kings - Ceiriog "Daybreak" transl. by Edmund O. Jones

From gloomy cot to sparkling palace - Maikof (Apollon Maykov) "On Lomonossoef" transl. by John Pollen

If you'll share there my ivy-crowned cot - Charles E. Trail "They May Tell of a Clime. To -- --" [Graham's Magazine v.XXXIII no.4, Oct. 1848]

Cottage.

Den.

Department Store:
Boxes bearing the names of lost department stores - Nancy Ellis Taylor "Voodoo Corner Bus Stop"

Depot:
The dock and depot waiting - Conrad Hilberry "Quatrain"

Dimestore:
A dimestore magic trick in legendary light - Regie Cabico "In a Legendary Light"

The dime store flower fields - francine j. harris "i used to write"

Stolen dime-store moments - Philip Levine "Magic"

Diner:
In the harsh inner light of an all-night diner - Edward Hirsch "The Task"

Distillery:
A distillery of virtue & fiction - Faylita Hicks "Letter to Black Girls"

Dollar Store:
Lay dollar store boats in the gutters - Eve L. Ewing "I come from the fire city"

Dwelling.

Edifice:
Up on a midtown metropolis edifice - David Henderson "Blues Franchise"

An edifice of temporal flame - C.R. Jury "A Sonnet to a Friend"

Embassy:
The secrets of your lunar embassy - Dana Gioia "Pardon Me, Pilgrim"

In tender embassy of love - William Shakespeare "Sonnet XLV"

In one rich embassy of gold - "The Summer"

Buzzing private embassies were sped - Edmund Clarence Stedman "The Blameless Prince"

Establishment:
Last rites in strange establishments - Diane Mehta "Ode to Patrick Kearns, Funeral Director of the Leo F. Kearns Funeral Home, in Queens"

Establishments of wind and light and cloud - Wallace Stevens "One of the Inhabitants of the West"

Factory.

Fallout Shelter:
Hunkered down in the old fallout shelter - Meep Matsushima "The Believers"

Fane:
Ruthless hands to rend the fairy fane - William Mountain "Dies Irae"

Dark fanes where truth has ceased to dwell - The Shepherd of Sharondale "The Infant's Burial" (The Knickerbocker v.23:5, May 1844)

Finishing School:
No finishing school's velvet etiquette - Stephanie Burt "Frostina"

Fort.

Fortress.

Gallery.

Gazebo:
The private gazebo of their youth - Solmaz Sharif "Patronage"

Generator Station:
A generator station opens its eye - Jake Skeets "Let There Be Coal"

Granary.

Grocery:
The grocer of despair - Leonard Cohen "Field Commander Cohen"

Pushing a grocery cart of empty beer cans - Hilarie Jones "The Teacher"

Scanning the cans on the grocery store shelf - Laura Kasischke "Near misses"

A trip to the grocery store at the end of the world - Meep Matsushima "The Believers"

Habitation:
The crowded habitation of the mind - N. Scott Momaday "The Essence of Belonging"

Halfway House:
halfway house for broken history - upfromsumdirt (Ron Davis) "Abstrack Africana"

Hen Coop:
Of raids on the pantry and hen-coop - Lucy Larcom "The Cat's Questions" [Fun and Frolic. No date. Edited by E.T. Roe.]

Hermitage:
Some hermitage of flutes and fibers - Conrad Hilberry "Open"

Hideout:
To bed me down among my love's hideouts - Seamus Heaney "The Betrothal of Cavehill"

High Rise:
Your subdivisions and high rises - John Yau "Charles Baudelaire and I Meet in the Oval Garden"

Home.

Hospice:
The far-famed Hospice crowns the heights - "The Brave Dog of St. Bernard" Chatterbox: Stories of Natural History. 1880]

Hospice of memory & malice - Chelsea Dingman "In the Third Trimester, They Can't Find a Heartbeat"

Hotel.

Hothouse:
Pining in vain some hothouse plant to meet - Wallace Irwin "An Inside Con to Refined Guys"

House

Hut.

Igloo:
Cutting out blocks of ice and fashioning another igloo - Robin Coste Lewis "Using Black to Paint Light: Walking Through a Matisse Exhibit Thinking about the Arctic and Matthew Henson"

Inn.

Jail.

Kennel:
No more shall I kennel with pain - Arthur Stringer "Hill-Top Hours"

Kiosk:
The kiosk shutters crash down - Elizabeth Bishop "Suicide of a Moderate Dictator"

Lean-To:
A lean to in a starved storm - dg nanouk okpik "For-The-Spirits-Who-Have-Rounded-The-Bend IIVAQSAAT"

Library.

Lighthouse.

Lodge.

Mall.

Mansion.

Mart.

Megaplex:
The megaplex of popcorn-scented tranquility - Laura Mullen "White Box (notes)"

Menagerie:
His menagerie lined up close behind - Alise Alousi "Back to School"

Mill.

Monolith:
Pylons and monoliths went on by ages - Gordon Bottomley "Babel: The Gate of the God"

The monoliths tell me everything - Gwynne Garfinkle "Scenes from a Marriage"

No monoliths inscribed with ancient rites - David Salisbury "On Mars"

Monument/Monumental.

Motel:
Such lit vacancy as interstate motels announce - Scott Cairns "A Lot"

A sparrow on the motel bed - Matthew Thorburn "An Annunciation"

Museum.

Observatory:
Drones sent from an alien observatory - Martins Deep "On a Dreamscape Where My Father Is a Spaceship Pirate"

Outhouse:
Outhouse meant a ravine brimmed with spiders - Lillian-Yvonne Bertram "Black Pastoral"

Palace.

Pavilion.

Pawnshop.

Penitentiary:
The penitentiary of free speech - Denise Duhamel "Delta Flight 656"

Plantation:
Between plantation memory and cosmic impulse - fahima ife "porous aftermath"

Used-up plantations worn and dry - Charles G. Leland "The Last Ditch" [The Continental Monthly v.2 no.2, March 1862]

Round a plantation of Old Nick's - Charles G. Leland "The Last Ditch" [The Continental Monthly v.2 no.2, March 1862]

Prison is a plantation made of stone & steel - Danez Smith "C.R.E.A.M."

Prison.

Pyramid.

Railway Station:
Liquid ticking in a petrified railway station - Bruce Boston "Surreal People"

Restaurant:
The restaurant no one goes to anymore - Rodger Kamenetz "Yogi"

Saloon:
Each raw saloon was raising Cain - Vachel Lindsay "John L. Sullivan, the Strong Boy of Boston"

Standing in the dust of saloons and public squares - José Martí "Love in the City" transl. by Esther Allen

Sidewinders in the saloons of fools - Ishmael Reed "I Am a Cowboy in the Boat of Ra"

Sawmill.

School/Scholar.

Schoolhouse:
A schoolhouse filled with dust - Fran Wilde "The Ghost Tide Chantey: Low"

Shack:
Foreman's shack at the mining pool's edge - Jack Kin Lim "Kuala Lumpur Urban Legends"

Shed.

Shelter.

Shop.

Shopping Mall:
A little space between shopping malls - Scott Cairns "A Lot"

Shrine.

Silo:
An elegy with silo and fever - Debra Allbery "Sidereal"

Electric fences and silos and shotguns - Laura Cranehill "We Let You Live"

Even the silos' shadows freeze - Chris Dombrowski "Some Nights the River"

Skyscraper.

Slaughterhouse:
That slaughterhouse of light - William Brewer "The Messenger of Oxyana"

Stable:
Stable your six dragon-steeds - Li Po "The Sun" transl. by Arthur Waley

Grass grows in a stable - Adil Tunyaz "But a Thorn Was Left in Our Tongues..." transl. by Aziz Isa Elkun

Stockade:
The stockade and the bastioned gate - Laura Da' "The Honest Tongue"

Store.

Storehouse:
Merely chaff from life's storehouse - Fenton Johnson "Harlem: The Black City"

In Time's storehouse lie days, hours, and moments - Fanny Kemble "Sonnet [Say thou not sadly, "never," and "no more,"]"

Filling up the vast storehouses of his mind - "Oration on Charles Sumner, Addressed to Colored People"

Strip Mall:
Scenes from a strip mall childhood - Feliz Lucia Molina "Paról"

An orchard behind the strip mall - Patrick Phillips "Matinee"

Stronghold:
To strongholds in the thickest woods - William Hodgson Ellis "The Skunk Cabbage"

In the assaulted stronghold of his will - Alice Meynell "The Unknown God"

This unbarred stronghold of sweet gold - Leonora Speyer "Fiddler's Farewell"

Structure.

Tavern:
In the tavern bear the golden cup - "Anthology of Jugoslav Poetry LIII: Mine Everywhere" transl. by Sir John Bowring

Whispers in a ghostly tavern - Sandy Florian "Phonograph"

Teahouse:
In a teahouse of the mind - Elizabeth Spires "Tea"

Temple

Tent.

Tenement.

Theater.

Tower.

Warehouse.

Watchtower:
In the watchtower that is my body - Jada Renée Allen "Interior"

The dread watch-tower of man's absolute self - Samuel Taylor Coleridge "To a Gentleman"

To purge the god of watchtowers - Kevin Goodan "Anaphora"

Way Station:
A little way station just beyond silence - Charles Wright "Future Tense"

Windmill.

Workshop.

Ziggurat:
Waves as high as ziggurats - Timothy Donnelly "Globus Hystericus"

Navigation Links:
Go to Potential Titles: Geographic/Landscape Features [category].
Go to author indices.
Go to word indices.
Go to category indices.

Abdomen:
A low-pressure system in the abdomen - Amaud Jamaul Johnson "LA Police Chief Daryl Gates Dead at 83"

Afterbirth:
Floating on the currents of afterbirth - Cynthia Hogue "The Changeling"

Shiny with its afterbirth of light - Gregory Orr "Eden and After: To See"

Anatomy:
Her anatomy in irregular stars - B. K. Fischer "Week 30 (Maternity Bathing Suit)"

Don't mistake anatomy for emotion - Lisa Sewell "Letter from a Haunted Room"

Ankle.

Antenna:
Into the hungry rustle of antennae - Igor Gulin "Kontur" transl. by Your Language My Ear

Acts as an antenna for the sun - Amy King "The Moon in Your Breath"

With its long antennae of rage - D.H. Lawrence "Hibiscus and Salvia Flowers"

Dainty antennae for the touch and withdrawal - Lola Ridge "The Ghetto"

Antler.

Arm.

Artery.

Ass:
A giraffe beats a lion's ass every day - Jericho Brown "Aerial View"

Another howling coyote ass chorus of disapproval - Raquel Gutiérrez "Would It Kill Me to Be a Nicer Guy?"

filling with the red rain of his grab-assing hurricane - Ed Roberson "American Quartet"

Back (all usages).

Beak.

Beard.

Belly.

Bile:
my tongue is bile & tomorrow - Jzl Jmz "Exhibition"

grow bile and peaks of anger - Brandon O'Brien "The Creature from the Black Lagoon Is Your Father"

Bill:
Came with strawberry leaves in her bill - Elizabeth Madox Roberts "Babes in the Woods"

Birthmark:
A birthmark with visions to see past illusions - Votey Cheav "When a Kingdom Falls/Shakti's Kisses"

Birthmarks on curved ivory tusks - Cynthia Manick "A Taste of Blue"

Bladder:
The bladder and the kidney began to quarrel - Ishmael Reed "Skin Tight"

Blood.

Bloodstream

Blowhole:
Moonlit blowhole plumes of sound - Brandy Nālani McDougall "This Island on Which I Love You"

Body.

Bone [category].

Bosom.

Bowel:
In the bowels of the concrete monster - Joy Harjo "Hieroglyphic"

Which troubles the bowels of earth - Mrs. A. Ritson "Classical Enigmas"

Brain.

Brainstem:
half minutes of fire in my brainstem - Kaveh Akbar "Against Dying"

Breast.

Brow.

Butt:
Under the florescent butts of night's cigarette - Amber Tamblyn "Epilogue"

Calf:
Nettles seizing at her calves - Caroline Harper New "The Elephant Mother"

Callus.

Capillary:
Pluck apart capillaries to weave my cradle - Sara S. Messenger "Your Subcutaneous Mermaid"

Carapace:
An empire of moss, dead yellow, and carapace - Randall Mann "The Fall of 1992, Gainesville, Florida"

Safe inside our carapaces - Devin Miller "The Malachite Storm"

Inside the carapace of dress - Claire Millikin "The Unpopular Dress"

The beetle with its carapace of sun - Kiki Petrosino "The Child Was in the Woods"

Cartilage:
cartilage sighing apart like petals - Jennifer Mace "Morphology"

Caul:
By dark in the caul of the devil - John Bosworth "A Boy Can Wear a Dress"

Wearing the century's dark caul - Claudia Emerson "Atlas"

Born to trade as to a caul - Lola Ridge "The Ghetto"

Cheek.

Chest.

Chin:
I wear your black cursive on my chin - Yalie Saweda Kamara "Trim"

Folded close beneath whisker and chin - Joyce Sidman "Shhh! They Are Sleeping"

Gather the chin hairs of a man-eating goat - A.E. Stallings "Fairy-tale Logic"

Chrysalis.

Claw.

Cocoon.

Collagen:
Diminished to a hush of keratin and collagen - Lyz Soto "Today I Am Full of Birds"

Not collagen but spite - Wendy Xu "Notes on Sentence Crossing"

Cornea:
Pockets of mist in night's corneas - Sheikha A. "Nesters"

Corpse.

Cortex:
Inside the raw cortex of songs - Joy Harjo "Autobiography"

Countenance:
A glance of wrath upon her countenance - Myron L. Mason "Zenobia" [Graham's Magazine v.XXXIII no.4, Oct. 1848]

The countenance and gestures of Mercy - J. Sylvester "Mercy and Justice" [Mirror of Literature v.13 issue 358, Feb. 1829.]

Craw:
A funeral like a craw full of teeth - Pablo Neruda "Evening LIX" transl. by Stephen Tapscott

Crest.

Cytoplasm:
In the cytoplasm of their cells - Gospel Chinedu "In a Tissue Processing Class the Lecturer Tells the Biafra War Through the Lenses of a Microscope"

Dendrite:
The dendrite branching of frost on a window pane - Stephen Leggett "Seven Winter Poems"

DNA:
Taught recombinant DNA to recombine - Duane Ackerson "What If"

With a DNA sequence of bullets & blood - Gospel Chinedu "In a Tissue Processing Class the Lecturer Tells the Biafra War Through the Lenses of a Microscope"

Ear.

Eardrum:
Beating in the sky's eardrum - Deema K. Shehabi "Vista"

Egg/Eggshell.

Elbow.

Embryo:
To will those gossamer embryos into growth - Geffrey Davis "The Epistemology of Rosemary"

Entrails:
Look into the entrails of Uranus - Audre Lorde "A Woman Speaks"

In the darkest entrails of greenness - Pablo Neruda "The South" transl. by Alastair Reid

To the entrails of the earth - Paul Valery "Palme" as translated by May Sarton in 1954

Epithelium:
An epithelium of silence - Gospel Chinedu "In a Tissue Processing Class the Lecturer Tells the Biafra War Through the Lenses of a Microscope"

Eye.

Eyebrow:
An eyebrow in the ocean - Rindon Johnson "There Is a Black Fly in Your Chardonnay"

Each change of love in eyelids and eyebrows - Algernon Charles Swinburne "Before Parting"

Eyelash:
His eyelashes wept blood - Jami "Salaman and Absal: The Burning of Absal" transl. by Edward Fitzgerald

Weaving webs from goblin eyelashes - Lincoln Michel "Another Tuesday Afternoon"

Empty nest of eyelashes & dandelions - Molly Raynor "This Is the Undone Season"

Penitent as eyelashes - Emily van Kley "Small Traffic"

Unfeeling reality screened by eyelashes - Zheng Min "Naked Exposure #10: Glass Windows" translator not credited. Source: https://projects.zo.uni-heidelberg.de/archive2/DACHS_Leiden/poetry/MD/Zheng_Min_trans.pdf

Eyelid.

Face.

Fang.

Fat.

Feathers.

Feet/Foot.

Fetal:
Mirror the fetal scroll of fiddlehead ferns - Kimberly Blaeser "Cadastre, Apostle Islands"

Fin:
Replaced by a dark fin cutting out to sea - Duane and Cathy Ackerson "Second Bait"

Thrashing the waves with fins of gold - Roy Campbell "The Porpoise"

A hundred fins in the ocean of my chest - Zilka Joseph "Gourami Fish Tale"

A shattering of murky fins raining into silver scales - Laura Ma "Cradling Fish"

Finger.

Fingernail.

Fingerprint.

Fingertip.

Fist.

Flank.

Fleece.

Flesh.

Forearm:
You drew your visions on my forearm - Amie Whittemore "The Alien Epistles, Letters 1-3"

Forehead.

Freckle.

Fur.

Gall.

Gene/Genetic.

Gill:
Red claws to clutch and gills to gasp - Leah Bobet "Full Fathom Five"

Gills hidden under keloid skin - Rain Prud'homme-Cranford "Gills"

Gland:
This honey-glanded pitcher plant - Jennifer Elise Foerster "Hvmken 11"

Gullet:
Its gullet is full of pennies - Aimee Le "American Poetry/The Age of Hypocrisy, Part II"

Gut.

Hair.

Hand.

Head.

Heart.

Heartbeat.

Heel.

Hind Leg:
Herds of triceratops lunge up on their hind legs - Kaveh Akbar "The Perfect Poem"

Hip:
The hips of this vast & immovable grief - Hanif Abdurraqib "It Is Maybe Time to Admit That Michael Jordan Definitely Pushed Off"

Kept a poultice of stars strapped to her hip - Roshani Chokshi "Miracle Babies"

Hip broken under the weight of time - Anoma Kanie "All that You Have Given Me, Africa" transl. by Kathleen Weaver

Every bone in the snake is the hipbone - Patricia Lockwood "The Hypno-Domme Speaks, and Speaks and Speaks"

Hock:
Train piston for hock & hoof - Brandon Som "Resistors"

Hoof/Hooves.

Horn.

Hump:
a camel with a hump of sticks - Valzhyna Mort "In the Woods of Language, She Collects Beautiful Sticks"

Ichor:
The ichor spilling from this illusion - Lisa M. Bradley "Nuestra Señora de las Maravillas Lost at Sea, 1527"

Polished stones hardened from ichor - Cyree Jarelle Johnson "false sonnet embroidered w/four loko empties"

Blood thins to Gods' ichor - Stephen Oliver "Zionism"

Immune System:
The endless battle between my immune system & embedded phosphorus - Casey Aimer "Body Revolt"

Incisor:
Whose sharp incisors have gnawed many a keel - Thomas Bailey Aldrich "Wyndham Towers"

Innards:
With the innards from an old fashioned clock - G. O. Clark "Mary Has a Prophetic Vision"

Intestine:
Biologists will unspool her empty intestines - Rachel Dillon "A dead whale can feed an entire ecosystem"

Ivory.

Jaw.

Joint.

Keloid:
Gills hidden under keloid skin - Rain Prud'homme-Cranford "Gills"

Keratin:
Diminished to a hush of keratin and collagen - Lyz Soto "Today I Am Full of Birds"

Kidney:
The bladder and the kidney began to quarrel - Ishmael Reed "Skin Tight"

Knee.

Knuckle.

Lap.

Larynx:
Silence that deluged the larynx - Gospel Chinedu "In a Tissue Processing Class the Lecturer Tells the Biafra War Through the Lenses of a Microscope"

With screens of mourning in their larynx - Oriana Méndez "Farewells" transl. by Erin Moure

Leg.

Ligament:
for how long will the ligaments last - Jarid Arraes "Movement"

Limb.

Lip.

Liver:
With my liver gnawed by mice - Daisy Aldan "The Little Mermaid"

Eat cod liver oil and oatmeal - Lou Barrett "Oliver Hill Hotel: 1932"

A liquor I mix'd with my cod-liver oil - Henry S. Leigh "Songs of the Sick Room No. 1: Cod Liver Oil"

The liver was a prophet - Kristen Tracy "Hepatoscopy"

Loin:
Loins of the lion and splendor of the eagle - William Rose Benét "The City"

In the strong loins of time - Eunice Tietjens "Children of War"

Lungs.

Mandible:
Once smeared on the mandible of a bee - RK Fauth "Playing with Bees"

On the mandible of a bee - RK Fauth "Playing with the Bees"

Bowed mandibles chittering superstitious drivel - Sara Omer "Djinndroid"

Mane:
A horse carries autumn in his mane - Joseph Fasano "Mahler in New York"

One mane of a thousand lions - Lola Ridge "Firehead part VI: The Merchant of Babylon 3: Lullaby"

The whistling mane of every wind - Charles Warren Stoddard "Ave Maria Bells"

Dry the damp on the horse's mane - Judy Patterson Wenzel "Come Shaker Life"

Maw.

Membrane.

Metabolism:
In the overheating metabolism of destiny - John Kinsella "Reptile in Roof Space"

The metabolism of the hidden springs - Tim Newcomb "Ten Minutes South of the Port of Tacoma"

Moustache/Mustache:
Made yourself a mustache of gold - Lou Barrett "Oliver Hill Hotel: 1932"

Twirled his November moustaches - William Carlos Williams "Light Hearted William"

Quietly twirling his green moustaches - William Carlos Williams "Light Hearted William"

Mouth.

Muscle.

Musk:
Sweet with breath of musk - Marguerite Radclyffe-Hall "A Night in Italy"

Live to breath April's musk another day - L. Lamar Wilson "Lauren Oya Olamina Explains Earthseed to Ernest Hemingway"

Neck.

Nerve.

Nerve Ending:
The nerve endings of tendons are fueled by the sun - Rodrigo Toscano "Habilitas"

Nervous System:
Our rightly designated nervous systems - Scott Cairns "Adventures in New Testament Greek: Nous"

Neural/Neuron.

Nose:
To leave dog's noses no evidence - KaNikki Jakarta "A Wading"

Powder their noses with pollen - Maurya Simon "Angels"

Nostril:
Black, curdling fog climbing into their nostrils - Tylor James "I Grew Up in a Haunted House"

Inside the nostrils of searchlights - Ilya Kaminsky "Soldiers Aim at Us"

Nucleus.

Organ.

Palate:
Burst Joy's grape against his palate - John Keats "Ode on Melancholy"

Palm (body part).

Pancreas:
The thyroid and the pancreas joined the outbreak - Ishmael Reed "Skin Tight"

Pate:
The feather pate of folly bears the falling sky - A.E. Housman "A Shropshire Lad XLIX"

Paw.

Pelt:
The selkie who slips her wet pelt - Caitriona O'Reilly "II. The Mermaid (from The Sea Cabinet)"

Strands of willow in my pelt - Kiki Petrosino "Little Gals"

At home in his pelt and subtle paws - Tom Sleigh "The Fox"

Physique:
Their red and golden physique of sly heat - Joanne Merriam "First Contact"

Pinion.

Placenta:
To ask the placenta for its numerical origin - Zaina Alsous "To a Young Poet"

Plume.

Pore:
Through my pores of stone - Alice Corbin Henderson "From the Stone Age"

Prosthetic:
Prosthetic molded to her mouth - Samantha H. Chung "Time Traveler's Haibun: 2024"

Protein:
all your proteins disassemble - Amy Beeder "My Poisonous Cousin the Pipevine Swallowtail"

Unlimited protein falling from the sky - Keith Taylor "One Species to Mourn"

Between spiraling strands of protein - Keith Taylor "Summer Teaching"

Protoplasm:
A protoplasm for next of kin - James C. Bayles "In the Gloaming"

The protoplasmic source of all things - Mary Hickman "Still Life with Rayfish"

Pulse.

Quill.

Retina:
Through the afterburn on my retinas - Lisa M. Bradley "Una Cancion de Keys"

Limned on the mind's retina - E.O.H. "Dreams" [Graham's Magazine v.XXXIII no.4, Oct. 1848]

Tinging the retina with rays from sky - Mrs. L.H. Sigourney "Laura Bridgman"

Ribosome:
Ribosomes in the scabbard of their maker - Gospel Chinedu "In a Tissue Processing Class the Lecturer Tells the Biafra War Through the Lenses of a Microscope"

Ring Finger:
Dollar bills for his index and ring fingers - Jake Skeets "Drunktown"

Ruff:
Lift the frowsy ruff of owls - Hailey Leithauser "Fever"

Scalp:
I wear their writhing roots across my scalp - Molly Raynor "A Dressed Up Potato Is Still a Potato (Yiddish Proverb)"

Pythons and boa constrictors plucked from a gorgon's scalp - Alyza Taguilaso "Add to Cart"

Seashell.

Shell.

Shoulder.

Sinew.

Skin.

Smile.

Snout:
Of ancient blood devoured by the jaguars' snouts - Pablo Neruda "Guatemala" transl. by Jack Schmitt

Catch the sun upon their snouts - Lola Ridge "Death Ray"

The snouts of the hungry hunting storms - Carl Sandburg "The Windy City"

Sole/Solely.

Spit.

Spleen.

Spoor:
Silting their famished spoor of boots and buttons - Sonya Taaffe "Amitruq Nekyia"

Sternum:
The stone sternum of night - Urayoan Noel "cinquains written during a tropical storm"

Spirits bang on my sternum - Tatiana Figueroa Ramirez "Bomba"

to thread my sternum through to you - Dior J. Stephens "a letter to charlie parker"

Sting.

Stomach.

Sweat.

Synapse:
Lightning leapt from her synapses - Mike Allen "Metarebellion"

Of synapses snapping in your mind - Andrew Sinclair "Queer-Pastoral, Somewhere in the Slipstream"

Syrinx:
But understand the notes through each syrinx - Nickole Brown "Prayer to be Still and Know"

Tail.

Talon.

Taste Bud:
Taste buds adjusting to the taste of hunger - Susan Nguyen "Letter to the Diaspora" p.56

Tear.

Teardrop.

Teeth/Tooth.

Tendon.

Tentacle:
And toss about their tentacles of gleaming steel - Alexander Anderson "A Blackbird's Nest" [Chambers' Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, 5th series, no.28-v.I, 12 July 1884]

Faint interlocking tentacles of sound - Stephen Vincent Benet "The First Vision of Helen"

sprawling tentacles and gripping ivy - Isaac Miranda "Daphne"

A tentacle of the vast dawn - Lola Ridge "To Alexander Berkman"

Thorax:
Her thorax full of strange ideas - Leah Komar "Colony Collapse Disorder"

Throat.

Thumb.

Thumbprint.

Thyroid:
The thyroid and the pancreas joined the outbreak - Ishmael Reed "Skin Tight"

Toe.

Tongue.

Tonsil:
a tonsil in the mouth of space and time - upfromsumdirt (Ron Davis) "Bleeding The Calf"

Tress:
Paint your tresses with silvered brush - John Philip Bourke "Till Day Is Done"

The hopvine's tresses sweeping the low roof - Miss Virginia Townsend "The House in the Lane" [The Continental Monthly v.5 no.5, May 1864]

Drowning in the tresses of a darker Lorelei - Humbert Wolfe "Heine's Last Song"

Trunk.

Tusk:
With ragged tusks of anger - Elizabeth Barrett Browning "A Drama of Exile"

A wave with tusks of a boar - Fanny Stearns Davis "Storm Dance"

Birthmarks on curved ivory tusks - Cynthia Manick "A Taste of Blue"

Who parted waters with a glistening tusk - Lola Ridge "Easter Morning"

Umbilical Cord:
terror is the knotty clutch of an umbilical cord - DaMaris B. Hill "Come. Pray. Know"

Underbelly:
The tide with the grainy underbelly of industrial light - Christopher Buckley "Prayer To Escape The East"

Upper Arm:
Two wounds in my upper arm and in my heart - Charles Wright "My Old Clinch Mountain Home"

Vascular:
The vascular trauma of hurt in my blood - Prageeta Sharma "Lateral Violence"

The vascular system of flowering things - Jessica P. Wick "Sap and Superstition"

Vein.

Venom.

Visage:
Could match its awful visage - James H. Cousins "Legend of the Blemished King"

Down the blank visage of the wall - William D. Howells (uncredited) "The Old Homestead" [The Atlantic Monthly v.07 no.40, Feb. 1861]

Upturns its furrowed visage - George Santayana "Mont Brevent"

A shattered visage - Percy Bysshe Shelley "Ozymandius"

Viscera:
Visceral commitment to rearrange space - Andrea Abi-Karam "DEAR GABRIELLE"

Knowing that each layer is a viscera of pain - Giorgiomaria Cornelio "La specia storta (The Bent Species)" transl. by Moira Egan

Land in the viscera of night - Elizabeth Rees "Scorched Earth"

Vocal Cords:
The honey I swallow to soothe the vocal cords - Regie Cabico "Morning After the Election"

Voice.

Voice box:
Like a collector of voice boxes - Raymond Antrobus "Samantha"

Waist.

Whisker:
Cat's whiskers to the east - Mary Jo Bang "In the Quieter Aftermath"

Layers of shivers and whiskers - Kay Ryan "On the Difficulty of Drawing Oneself Up"

Folded close beneath whisker and chin - Joyce Sidman "Shhh! They Are Sleeping"

Wing.

Womb:
Returning to the barren womb of nothing - Robert Blair "The Grave"

That in the womb of Time yet sleep - Fanny Kemble "The Vision of Life"

In the dark womb where I began - John Masefield "C.L.M."

Wrist.

Yolk:
Creatures came coated with yolks of myth - Sheikha A. "Nesters"

Yolks needed to bind portraits to walls - R.A. Villanueva "When Doves"

Navigation Links:
Go to author indices.
Go to word indices.
Go to category indices.

Address.

Aisle.

Alcove.

Altar.

Anteroom:
Dusted the anteroom with alibi gray - Mary Jo Bang "Lydia's Suite: One without Has Two or Three Within"

Arch.

Architect/Architecture.

Archway:
Each step circled into tight archways - Mouna Ammar "In a Moroccan Riad"

Archways lined with faded saints - Eugene Lee-Hamilton "A Pageant of Siena"

Attic.

Auditorium:
Filling the auditoriums with empty skulls - Tim Seibles "Vendetta, May 2006"

Balcony.

Ballroom:
Extending into a glittering muted ballroom - Daisy Aldan "The Bay"

Left a chortling hyena in her ballroom clothes - Mike Allen "Carrington's Ferry"

In the vast ballroom of the universe - Russ Bickerstaff "Why Norm Jones Never Feels Like He Gets Anything Done in a Day"

Balustrade:
Brushes the blossoms against the balustrade - Li Bai "Songs to the Peonies Sung to the Air: 'Peaceful Brightness'" transl. by Florence Wheelock Ayscough

Descend over the flaking balustrades - Grace Nichols "Nuptial on Brighton Beach"

The balustrade's tipped ladder tracking infinity - Cynthia Zarin "Orbit"

Banister:
The meek hand on a banister - Mary Jo Bang "Oh, Dear, What Can the Matter Be"

Basement.

Bath/Bathe.

Bathroom:
Chiron in broken bathroom light - Beasa A. Dukes "After Watching 'Moonlight'"

Water slouching through a bathroom ceiling - Kay Gabriel "Like, Comma, Like"

leaving sigils in lipstick on the bathroom mirrors - Amanda Gafford "Tigerlily"

Bathtub.

Battlement.

Bedroom:
Become manifest in abandoned bedrooms or kitchens - Bruce Boston "Ghost People"

A goose arrives at his bedroom window - Dorothy Chan "Triple Sonnet for My Father's Pet Goose, Pigeon Wars, and Daddy Issues"

Baboon rattling the bedroom door - Cynthia Zarin "Orbit"

Belfry:
Far away the solemn belfries toll - Maurice Baring "Beethoven"

The swallow's eggs are laid along the belfry walls - Lord de Tabley "The Churchyard on the Sands"

The hushed belfry of the heart - William H.C. Hosmer "My Study"

That my ribs might make a belfry - Cynthia Zarin "Metaphysicks XI: Cathexis"

Berth:
Shaking you free from your perilous berth - Amy Redpath Roddick "A Scientific Puzzle"

Blackboard.

Bleachers:
Brachiosauruses by the bleachers - Haley Bossé "When the Time Comes to Split the Gym"

Blueprint.

Bolt.

Breakfast Nook;
Mistress of the breakfast nook - Jennifer Key "Rich People in Paintings,"

Buttress:
A dim fear passed through buttress, and roof, and beam - Edward Thring "Borth Lyrics: II. The Summons"

Buttressed with unnumbered tiers of ruddy rock - Henry van Dyke "The Grand Canyon: Daybreak"

Cabinet.

Cafeteria:
Set up exhibits in the cafeteria - Alison Hawthorne Deming "Science"

Carrel:
Scholarly spiders relax in their carrels - Ted Kooser "Home Storage Barns"

Casement:
The marigold unbarred her casement bright - Louise Imogen Guiney "The White Sail"

Waking breezes round the casement pipe - Elizabeth Drew Stoddard "Closed"

Ceiling.

Cellar.

Chamber.

Chandelier.

Chimney.

Cistern:
Into the deeper cistern of his soul - Julia Alvarez "Regreso"

Drowsy heart stirs from the cistern - Catherine Bowman "Heart"

Voices singing out of empty cisterns and exhausted wells - T.S. Eliot "The Waste Land V: What the Thunder Said"

Closet.

Colonnade:
Girt by a colonnade of crysolite - Rufus Dawes "Marriage" [Graham's Magazine v.XIX no.5, Nov. 1841]

Column.

Corner.

Cornerstone:
From the foundations to the last edge of the cornerstone - William Ernest Henley "Rhymes and Rhythms"

Jesus leaned on the cornerstone - Brandon O'Brian "Population Changes"

The cornerstone in Truth is laid - Henry van Dyke "For the Friends at Hurstmont"

Corridor.

Counter/Countertop.

Crenelation:
Flamboyant crenelations of glory - John Gould Fletcher "Green Symphony"

Foliage, crenelated, dark at the root - Janet Kauffman "Upended By Error"

Cubicle:
Away from this year's cubicle to night class - Carlie Hoffman "After Morlot Avenue"

Cupboard.

Deadbolt:
Eyes lock in deadbolt time - dg nanouk okpik "Twilight Pain"

Den.

Dome.

Door.

Doorknob.

Doorsill:
The doorsill where two worlds touch - Rumi "Quatrains" transl. by Coleman Barks

Doorstep.

Doorway.

Drain.

Drawbridge:
Let portcullis and drawbridge fall - Brinhild "The Rime of Sir Lionne" [Chambers' Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, 5th series, no.32-v.I, 9 Aug. 1884]

Above the darkening drawbridge - Clarence Victor Stahl "The Sinking of the Titanic"

Drywall:
Pain coiled in the drywall - Kiki Petrosino "Farm Book"

Dungeon.

Eaves/Eavesdrop.

Elevator:
A broken elevator trying to contain its freefall - Alise Alousi "Skip"

take elevators and stairs to more deserted spaces - Katrine Øgaard Jensen "Playing Myst with a Ghost One Week in Spring"

An elevator hauled by golden chains - Marge Simon "Sightings: Algis Budrys"

Entrance.

Escalator:
The escalator, rolling ever down - Mike Allen "Ascending"

Watch the escalator's endless crawl - Patrick Phillips "Galleria Ode"

Take the palace escalator heavenward - Jackie Wang "Life is a Place Where it's Forbidden to Live"

Faucet:
Orchids are gushing out from the faucets - Kaveh Akbar "Orchids Are Sprouting from the Floorboards"

The kitchen with its ticking faucet - Wendy Chen "Fastened V"

Don't take faucets for fountainheads - Dorothea Tanning "All Hallow's Eve"

Fence.

Fireplace:
Kneels before an empty fireplace - Ansel Elkins "Someone Forgot to Whisper Your Death to the Bees"

The pocketed dark behind fireplace brick - Pamela Gross "The Hive"

Floor.

Floorboards:
Orchids are sprouting from the floorboards - Kaveh Akbar "Orchids Are Sprouting from the Floorboards"

Beneath the floorboards of my thought - Michael McGriff "Inversion"

Between the floorboards seedlings rise - Lynette Mejía "Abandon"

Foundation.

Fountain.

Furnace.

Gable:
Wind across the gable roofs singing sad - Miriam Clark Potter "Lady Mother"

Gallery.

Garret:
A glee among the garrets - Emily Dickinson "Book 3: Time and Eternity V: Ending"

With nooks and garrets and stairs - Sandy Florian "House"

Littered with memories like ancient garrets - Lola Ridge "Manhattan Lights"

Gate.

Grate.

Greenroom:
Toward the greenroom of John Wilkes Booth - Paul Gregory Nauert "Leaping Through the Centuries"

Gutter.

Hall.

Hallway.

Hearth.

Hearthstone.

Hinge.

Keyhole.

Kitchen.

Laboratory:
In this most awful secret laboratory - Mary Aldis and Arthur Davison Ficke "Chloroform"

A Dr. Frankenstein in the lab with herself - Elizabeth Knapp "Self-Portrait as Cindy Sherman's Instagram Account"

Caught in a laboratory without a science - Adrienne Rich "Letters to a Young Poet"

Larder:
Feeding the partisans from frugal larders - Adrienne Rich "Char"

Latch.

Laundry Room:
The brew in the alchemist's laundry room - Rober Frazier "Primer to Impractical Magic"

Library.

Lift Shaft:
In a lift shaft on the other side of the night - Emily Berry "Ghosts (Homage to Burial)"

Lightning Rod:
My spine a lightning rod for shudders - Tylor James "I Grew Up in a Haunted House"

Lightning-rods for plumes - Henry Coggswell Knight "Lunar Stanzas"

Linoleum:
Linoleum's absurd and personal mystique - Boris Dralyuk "Notation"

Lintel:
The lintel black with absence and size - Kevin Killian "The Door into Darkness"

And a lintel of honeysuckle - "King and Hermit" transl. by Kuno Meyer

The lucid moment and the shadow across the lintel - Arthur Stringer "The Question"

Living Room:
If you see me praying in the living room - Yalie Saweda Kamara "Mother's Rules"

Prowling the living room for the lightning - Brenda Shaughnessy "Me in Paradise"

Loading Bay:
A baggage of stars thudded on the loading bay - Stephen Oliver "An Actual Encounter With The Sun On My Balcony At France Street"

Lobby:
Popcorn and figs in the lobby - John M. Ford "Troy: the Movie"

A lobby of the skyscraper museum - David Henderson "Blues Franchise"

Lock.

Lounge:
Lounges in an abstract of boxwood and holly - Sonya Taaffe "Idle Thoughts While Watching a Faun"

Lych-Gate:
Where the lych-gate casts its cool dark shadow - G.S. "Butterflies" [Chambers' Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, 4th series, 30 March 1878]

Marquee:
Across the marquees of legions of subway cars - David Henderson "Blues Franchise"

Mezzanine:
Used to chainsmoke on the mezzanine - Patrick Phillips "Galleria Ode"

Minaret:
The minarets of an organic metropolis - Bruce Boston & Robert Frazier "A Compass for the Mutant Rain Forest"

Torches on each minaret's height - Felicia Hemans "The Abencerrage Canto III"

Rose like minarets of dream - George Sterling "Then and Now"

Nave:
In naves of a deconsecrated church - Brandon Som "Resistors"

And from the nave build haunted heaven - Wallace Stevens "A High-Toned Old Christian Woman"

Niche:
A seaside saint in her clifftop niches - Robert MacFarlane and Jackie Morris "thrift"

The leafy scrolls and fretted niches - A.A.P. "The Carver's Lesson" (in The Cornhill Magazine v.1 no.5)

A Fairy Temple with one niche empty - Po-Chu-i "Taoism and Buddhism" (translated by Arthur Waley)

Nook.

Nurse/Nursery.

Office.

Palisade:
Ten poles before their palisades - G.K. Chesterton "The Ballad of the White Horse: Book V. Ethandune: The First Stroke"

Palisade wrenched gold of Nineveh - Hart Crane "Recitative"

Stretching above the silent palisade - Marguerite Radclyffe-Hall "Silent Places"

Pane/Windowpane.

Pantry:
The pantry full of lilies - Laura Kasischke "Kitchen Song"

Of raids on the pantry and hen-coop - Lucy Larcom "The Cat's Questions" [Fun and Frolic. No date. Edited by E.T. Roe.]

Intimate tenant of pantries - Hailey Leithauser "Jiminy"

Line their pantry shelves with the antioxidant beads - Crystal Sidell "The Truth About Doppelgangers"

Parapet:
Along the Parapet of Night - Coningsby Dawson "Daybreak"

Ruin and fallen parapets predict my fate - Ali-Shir Nava'i "Love Song of Nava'i (7)" transl. by Dennis Daly

Built their parapets in the air - Thomas O'Hagan "Langemarck"

Brick parapets burning cold orange - Mayra Paris "New York, 2009"

From parapets of light - Herbert Randall "To the Standish Guards of the Old Colony"

Parlor:
Phantom tendrils through parlor air - Timothy Donnelly "Globus Hystericus"

Science, art, and parlor games - Dorothy Parker "Neither Bloody Nor Bowed"

Orchards alive in the parlor - Kiki Petrosino "Monticello House Tour"

The ice cream parlor Osiris - Philip Schultz "Luxury: One"

Passage/Passenger.

Penthouse:
The ethereal execs in the celestial penthouse - Mike Allen and Ian Watson "Seventh Coming"

Peristyle:
A peristyle of pines sings requiem - Helen Keller "The Song of the Stone Wall"

Pillar.

Plaster.

Porch.

Portal.

Portico:
Empty porticoes that led to nowhere - Deborah L. Davitt "Drowning in this Sunken City"

The portico hung o'er a flight of alabaster - Rufus Dawes "Marriage" [Graham's Magazine v.XIX no.5, Nov. 1841]

Twine in the kingdom's portico - Ted Mathys "Key to the Kingdom"

Densities of opal within sleep's portico - Cecilia Meireles "The Dead Horse" transl. by James Merrill

Pulpit:
From their pulpits sealed with dust - Francis Beaumont "On the Tombs in Westminster Abbey"

Rafter.

Rampart.

Roof.

Room.

Sacristy:
Into the sacristies of treason - Pablo Neruda "Madrid (1936)" translated by Richard Schaaf

Scullery:
Lined with the forgotten ashes of scullery maids - Sandra Kasturi "Carnaval Perpetuel"

Shelf.

Shower.

Shutter.

Sill.

Smokestack:
Lurched between two smokestack towns - Hala Alyan "Turnpike // Ghost"

The horizon sucks at the smokestacks - Russell Brakefield "Gate Keeper"

A smokestack full of rage and fear - Tony Hoagland "A Short History of Modern Art"

They flex their smokestack lungs - Vincent Toro "¿Que Que La Femme?"

Spire.

Stage.

Stair.

Staircase.

Stairway.

Stairwell.

Steeple.

Step.

Stoop.

Storefront:
Storefront merchants hawking our wares - Jennifer G. Lai "In My Mind's Coral, Mother Still Calls Us from Inside"

Spray paint odes for boarded up storefronts - Barbara Jane Reyes "Downtown Oakland Poem"

Study.

Thatch:
Sparrows fighting on the thatch - John Clare "Summer Evening"

But she only thatched it with straw - "The Fox and the Geese"

behind our walls of thatch and moss and tin - upfromsumdirt (Ron Davis) "The Death of Olympia after Edouard Manet's Olympia, oil on canvas"

Theater.

Thermostat:
Our thermostat dreams - Joy Harjo "Grace"

Threshold.

Trellis.

Tunnel.

Turret.

Vane/Weathervane.

Vault.

Veranda:
A fierce macaw on the verandah - Edward Dowden "In the Garden"

Through the veranda's black iron bars - Tarfia Faizullah "The Interviewer Acknowledges Grief"

Vestibule:
The vestibule to experience - Marianne Moore "Reinforcements"

The horse of weeping in the charming vestibule - Amy Newman "Sylvia Plath Is in Paris with a Balloon on a Long String"

Fluctuating through an endless vestibule of time - Omodero David Oghenekaro "Questions for the Fallen"

Vestry:
washing their marbles in the vestry - Évelyne Trouillot "A Rain of Stars" [excerpts] transl. by Danielle Legros Georges

Wainscot:
Even the mouse in the wainscot - Julia C.R. Dorr "The Chimney Swallow"

Wall.

Waiting Room:
Waiting room made out of marzipan - Ana Bozicevic "Paris Pride Parade"

The universal ballad of the waiting room - Gregory Pardlo "Epistemology of the Phone Booth"

Wallpaper.

Weathervane: See Vane/Weathervane.

Your hawk feather a weathervane - Cynthia Zarin "Still Life (for Rose)"

Well.

Widow's Walk:
Watched from widow's walks worn thin - Fran Wilde "The Ghost Tide Chantey: Iron"

Window.

Windowpane.

Windowsill/Sill.

Wire.

Workshop.

Navigation Links:
Go to author indices.
Go to word indices.
Go to category indices.

Albatross.

Avian:
Prayed to avian gods we don't believe in - Keith Taylor "Acolytes in the Bird-While"

Bantam:
And raised a mighty bantam crow - Grace Greenwood "Babie Annie to Cousin J--, acknowledging the Christmas-gift of a chain"

Barn Swallow:
The barn swallows' sharp flight and cry - Diane Seuss "Six Unrhymed Sonnets"

Bird.

Bittern:
Take a string to a bittern's back - Katie Ford "The Throats of Guantanamo"

Heard the bitterns call from ruined palace-wall - Robert Graves "In the Wilderness"

As curlew, hern, and bittern pass - Emily Lawless "The Inalienable Heritage"

The brown bittern speaks in the bog - "A Sleep Song" transl. by P.H. Pearse

Blackbird.

Bluebird.

Bluejay.

Bobolink:
A town full of busy bobolinks - Amber aka Martha Everts Holden "A Little Goldenhead"

A bobolink left the bloom of a tree - Amber aka Martha Everts Holden "The Story of a Rose"

Nor the bobolink's trill the less laughs - Kate Putnam "Excuse" [The Continental Monthly v.6 no.4, August 1864]

Bulfinch:
The bulfinch marks me stealing by - C.S. Calverley "Sad Memories"

Buzzard.

Cactus Wren:
the cactus wren finished the lightning - Jake Skeets "Sonoran Desert Poem"

Canadian Geese:Mysteriously enlisted in a V formation of Canadian geese - Duane Ackerson "Three Urban Legends"

Canary:
The blue canary of my country - Ilya Kaminsky "4 a.m. Bombardment"

I would sing as the canary passes - Rickey Laurentiis "Because we love each other"

Cardinal:
The flash of cardinal in the reeds - Chelsea B. DesAutels "Annual Migration"

The burden of the cardinal virtues - Ellen Hinsey "Epistle"

Cardinals flying straight up - Diane Mehta "Ode to Patrick Kearns, Funeral Director of the Leo F. Kearns Funeral Home, in Queens"

Chaffinch:
Laugh at chaffinch and at primroses - Robert Graves "Not Dead"

Chickadee.

Chicken.

Cock:
Woe to the cock who strutteth on ice - "Anthology of Jugoslav Poetry CXV: Woes" transl. by J.W. Wiles

With a phantom's cockcrow smile - Aldous Huxley "Mole"

Braver notes the storm-cock sings - A.E. Housman "A Shropshire Lad X: March"

Cockatoo:
The green freedom of a cockatoo - Wallace Stevens "Sunday Morning"

Condor.

Cormorant.

Corncrake:
Call of the corncrake, cuckoo, or crane - credited to an emigrant named MacAmbrois "The Exile's Song" transl. by Eleanor Hull

Crane.

Crow.

Crying-Bird:
Disturb'd by the crane's and the crying-bird's screams - F.B.C. "The Quadrupeds' Pic-Nic"

Cuckoo.

Curlew.

Dodo:
The dwelling place for other dodos - Monica de la Torre "View from a Dodo Chair"

As famous as the pterodactyl or the dodo - Alison Hawthorne Deming "Science"

The demise of the dodo - Mary Soon Lee "I, Universe"

Dove.

Drake:
Where the wood drake rests in his beauty - Wendell Berry "The Peace of Wild Things"

Duck.

Eagle.

Egret.

Emu:
A lullaby of ostriches and emus - Deborah Ruddell "Penguin's Lullaby"

Falcon.

Field Sparrow:
One field sparrow song down-falling - Janet Kauffman "Air Here"

Finch.

Firebird:
The storm that douse the firebird - R.B. Lemberg "Firebird, Stormbird"

Fish-Hawk:
Takes from the fish-hawk his newly caught prey - F.B.C. "The Quadrupeds' Pic-Nic"

Flamingo.

Fledge/Fledgling.

Flicker:
First flicker drumming on a dead ash - Keith Taylor "Marginalia for a Natural History"

Fowl.

Gander:
These moonmad swans and ecstatic ganders - Lawrence Ferlinghetti "A Coney Island of the Mind, 11"

And all the ganders flee - Surdas "Sur's Ocean 35: The Pangs and Politics of Love" transl. by John Stratton Hawley

Gannet:
As gannets when the fish are due - John Masefield "The 'Wanderer'"

Geese/Goose.

Goldfinch:
Build a perch for the goldfinch - Rachel Barenblat "Open"

Goldfinches one by one will drop - John Keats "[I stood tip-toe upon a little hill]"

Goldfinches tumbling across the lawn - Ada Limon "It's the Season I Often Mistake"

And even the goldfinches have given up - Teresa J. Scollon "Untitled"

Gosling:
The happy clatter of little goslings - Surdas "Sur's Ocean 225: The Poet's Petition and Praise" transl. by John Stratton Hawley

When every little gosling sings - A.D.T. Whitney "Brahmic"

Grackle:
Sends the grackles into cedars - Frank Stanford "The Solitude of Historical Analysis"

Gray Owl:
Only the frogs and the gray owl know - Don Marquis "In the Bayou"

Great Blue Heron:
Rested in the dignity of the Great Blue Heron - Major Jackson "Song as Abridge Thesis of George Perkins Marsh's Man and Nature"

Great Horned Owl:
Awakened by a great horned owl - Alison Swan "Before the Snow Moon"

Great horned owls have not returned to the heron rookery - Keith Taylor "In Memory: Dan Minock"

Gull/Seagull.

Hawk.

Hen.

Heron.

Honey-Bird:
The honey-birds pipe to the budding figs - Sarojini Naidu "Spring"

Hoot Owl:
A hoot owl called to the moon - Yusef Komunyakaa "Ota Benga at Edenkraal"

House Finch:
House finch weaving its song - Terry Blackhawk "Maumee, Maumee"

Hummingbird.

Ibis:
The Ibis yet returns - Duncan Anderson "Sport"

Stitched by hungry ibises - Campbell McGrath "The Everglades"

Jackdaw:
My jackdaw Muse of the rebel and dark - Stephen Vincent Benet "November Prothalamion"

The jackdaw's noisy company - Giosue Carducci "On My Daughter's Marriage" transl. by Frank Sewall

The chattering jackdaw builds - Alfred Noyes "Darwin III: The Testimony of the Rocks"

Jay.

Junco:
Jays and juncos rallied to see - Bruce Ducker "Picnic"

Dark capped juncos hidden in dense foliage - Philip Levine "For the Country: The Garden"

Kestrel:
Blowing the poising kestrel over - John Masefield "On Malvern Hill"

Kingbird:
As kingfishers catch fire - Gerard Manley Hopkins "As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame"

The kingbird and the pensive thrush are fled - Archibald Lampman "September"

Kingfisher.

Kite.

Lapwing:
Where lapwings float at rest - Herbert Randall "The Angelus of Plymouth Woods"

Through startled lapwings now we run - Mary Webb "Market Day"

Encumbered with the shriek of lapwings - Veronica Zondek "cold fire 4" transl. by Katherine Silver

Lark.

Linnet.

Loon.

Lyrebird:
Lyrebird speaking stolen words - Amari Low "Themself"

Macaw:
A fierce macaw on the verandah - Edward Dowden "In the Garden"

Magpie.

Mallard:
Mallards carved in oily silken water - Daisy Aldan "The Bay"

Meadowlark:
Meadow-lark no less than nightingale - James Whitcombe Riley "Three Singing Friends"

Missel-Thrush:
Sweet sings the missel-thrush amid the crash - William Anderson "Landscape Lyrics No.IX--Autumn, in its First Aspect"

Mockingbird.

Moor-Fowl:
Sorrow in the cries of moor-fowls - Winfield Shiras "Sonnet"

Moor-Hen:
The moor-hen stepping from her reeds - Charlotte Mew "On the Asylum Road"

Night-Hawk:
Dream upon the night-hawks peopling heaven - Robert Frost "Waiting-- Afield at Dusk"

Night-Owl:
The little night-owl make her throne - Oscar Wilde "The Grave of Shelley"

Nightingale.

Nightjar:
Before the nightjar sounds his autumn note - "The Ch'u Tz'u: Encountering Sorrow" transl. by Burton Watson

A flock of nightjars watching over me - John Murillo "Dolores, Maybe"

The night-jar is abroad on the heath - "A Sleep Song" transl. by P.H. Pearse

Nuthatch:
the nuthatch, a glutton for its seeds - Jacqueline Osherow "Inspiration Point, Bryce Canyon, Utah"

Oriole.

Osprey:
That collects in the talons of the osprey - Pablo Neruda "Not Only the Albatross" transl. by Jack Schmitt

The kills osprey commit - Avni Vyas "After Bob Across the Street Fires His Gun at a Tree to Scare Off a Raccoon While My Son and I Walk, Rachel Shows Me Night Heron Chicks"

Keeping the ospreys from the chimney - Cynthia Zarin "Ouija Board"

Ostrich:
Ask you to emulate the flight path of an ostrich - dee(dee) c. ardan "freedom terrors"

What ostriches couldn't digest - Guy Wetmore Carryl "The Singular Sangfroid of Baby Bunting"

Eight pairs of ostriches in harness - Marianne Moore "He 'Digesteth Harde Yron'"

A lullaby of ostriches and emus - Deborah Ruddell "Penguin's Lullaby"

Owl.

Ox-Bird:
The ox-birds chase the tide - Lord de Tabley "The Churchyard on the Sands"

Parakeet:
A flock of wild parakeets comes to roost - Alexandra Lytton Regalado "La Mano"

Parrot.

Partridge.

Peacock.

Peafowl:
The number of bones in a peafowl - Hala Alyan "Siri as Mother"

Pelican.

Penguin:
Penguins fly through watersky - Eileen Spinelli "Water-Wings"

Peregrine:
a sparrow no one had kept an eye on except the peregrine - Ed Roberson "once the magnolia has blossomed"

Petrel:
To the petrel the swooping gale - Thomas Bailey Aldrich "Monody on the Death of Wendell Phillips"

Culvert, and petrel, and mangonel - Brinhild "The Rime of Sir Lionne" [Chambers' Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, 5th series, no.32-v.I, 9 Aug. 1884]

Safe as the petrel on tossing billow - Emily Bronte "The Two Children"

The petrel's wind flew over eternity - Pablo Neruda "Not Only the Albatross" transl. by Jack Schmitt

Pewit:
The pewit's cry only makes deeper nature's rest - Kirtle "My Home in Annandale Revisited" [Chambers' Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, 5th series, no.6-v.I, 9 Feb. 1884]

Pheasant.

Pigeon.

Pileated Woodpecker:
The pileated woodpecker's maniacal laugh - Chris Dombrowski "They Tied the Madmen to Trees Beside the River and All the Shrinks Went Out of Business"

Plover:
The plover of the lonesome hills - "The Fisherman's Keen, or the Lamentation of O'Donoghue of Affadown ('Roaring Water'), in the west of Co. Cork, for his three sons and his son-in-law, who were drowned" transl. by Anonymous

Tern and piping plover that keeps expansion along its shore - francine j. harris "Oregon Trail, Missouri"

Poultry:
Often with our Poultry running - "Fox Chace" [sic] [W. Belch's British Sports, for the Amusement of Children]

Quail.

Quetzal:
The outspread plumes of the quetzal bird - "III: Occe al Mismo Tono Tlamelauhcayotl | Another Plain Song, to the Same Tune" transl. from Nahuatl by Daniel G. Brinton

The quetzal I've snared - Paige Quinones "Wings Covert"

Raptor:
Raptor of iron plumage - Pablo Neruda "It Was Not You" transl. by Nathaniel Tarn

Raven.

Redbird:
Blue jays & redbirds wove light through leaves - Yusef Komunyakaa "The Whistle"

Ring-Dove:
A ring-dove let fall a sprig of yew - John Keats "Endymion, Book I [A thing of beauty is a joy for ever]"

Robin.

Rock Dove:
Where rock doves would be brought to nest - R.A. Villanueva "When Doves"

Rook.

Rooster.

Sandbird:
Sandbirds twittering glance through crystal air - Emma Lazarus "Fog"

Sandhill Crane:
As Sandhill cranes must thread the meadow - Jennifer Chang "Freedom in Ohio"

Evidence of traffic and sandhill cranes - Alison Swan "Signs"

Sandhill cranes poised between the tall grass and oaks - Emma Trelles "The Function of a Wing"

Screech-Owl:
Again the screech-owl shrieks - Robert Blair "The Grave"

Seabird:
Coax oil from a sea bird's throat - Rachel Dillon "A dead whale can feed an entire ecosystem"

The stasis of a seabird's dive - Paige Quinones "Elegy Ending on the Ocean Floor"

Hear seabirds cackle like ghosts - Yang Lian "Venice Elegy 2 Rot Poem" transl. by Brian Holton

Sea-lark:
The shrill short crying of the sea-lark - Edward Dowden "Among the Rocks"

Skylark.

Snipe:
The creak of broken rushes and the last snipe's cry - Lloyd Roberts "The Wind Tongues"

Snowbird:
Snowbirds spread their crystallized wings - Daisy Aldan "Mutilated Fire"

Snow birds and sooty herons caught - Mary Jo Bang "Pear and O, an Opera"

Songbird:
Let all the song-birds die of love - Pierre Dupont "A Serenade"

In the timeless throat of the songbird - D'Arcy McNickle "Old Isidore"

Sparrow.

Starling.

Stork:
The cry of a stork landing on the roof - Anna Akhmatova [Untitled] transl. Richard McKane

Swallow, bring the stork with you - "Where Are the Swallows?" [A Tale of Two Monkeys, Project Gutenberg]

Stormbird:
only the stormbird's flight is wild - Elizabeth Bartlett "stormbird"

Sunbird:
Sunbirds exalting the break of dawn - Gospel Chinedu "In a Tissue Processing Class the Lecturer Tells the Biafra War Through the Lenses of a Microscope"

Mountains and rivers and crimson sunbirds - Keith Taylor "Picasso and the Taj Mahal"

Swallow (bird).

Swan.

Tanager:
Whirling tanagers sucked in a wind-pocket - Amy Lowell "Red Slippers"

Thrush.

Towhee:
Notes and dyes of jay and towhee - May Swenson "Rain at Wildwood"

Turkey:
Three wild turkeys crossing the street - January Gill O'Neil "How to Love"

Turkey Vulture:
Turkey vultures circling in two by two - Douglas S. Jones "Sexy in the Food Chain"

Vulture.

Warbler.

Waterfowl:
Morning run among the lilies and the rowdy waterfowl - Scott Cairns "Idiot Psalms 2: A psalm of Isaak, accompanied by baying hounds"

Whippoorwill.

Wild-Bird:
Sweet chant of the wild-birds' morning hymn - Louisa May Alcott "Lily-Bell and Thistledown"

The wild bird flew scared from her desolate stone - Rev. James Gilborne Lyons "The Return to Lezayre" [Chambers' Edinburgh Journal no.456, 25 Sept. 1852]

Wild Geese:
Wild geese moved like a wedge between sky and sagebrush - Yusef Komunyakaa "The Whistle"

Wildfowl:
Big lagoons where wildfowl play - Andrew Barton 'Banjo' Paterson "Travelling Post Office"

Wood Drake:
Where the wood drake rests in his beauty - Wendell Berry "The Peace of Wild Things"

Woodpecker.

Wood-Thrush:
The wood-thrush ceased her song - Louise Imogen Guiney "The Rise of the Tide"

Whistle vespers to the wood thrush - Rosanna Warren "Man in Stream"

Wren.

Zebra Finch:
When the zebra finches felt the first pinch of climate change - Amie Whittemore "Future History of Earth's Birds"

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Backbone.

Birdbone:
Squeeze the air from her birdbone body - Danni Quintos "Letters to Imelda V"

Bone

Breastbone:
Cutting through the breastbone of the world - Christopher Kondrich "Common Things"

Canine [Teeth]:
When Allen's rebel howl bares sharp canines - G. O. Clark "American Poetry 101 Mashup" [Allen Ginsburg ]

Collarbone:
The precarious cliff of your collarbone - Jamaal May "Love Poem Moving Back and Forth Across Glass"

Exoskeleton:
Lichen to paint my exoskeleton in bursts of blue and yellow - Wren Douglas "Fursonas Are Not Enough, I Need to Be a Moss-Coated Mech"

The exoskeletons of survival strategies - James Galvin "Earthquake"

Measuring what my exoskeleton withstands - Rusty Morrison "Measurement Fable"

Fingerbone:
Give us their incandescent fingerbones - Charles Wright "Detour"

Fishbone:
Fishbone stuck to my throat - Lu Christófaro "I See You Too"

Hipbone:
Every bone in the snake is the hipbone - Patricia Lockwood "The Hypno-Domme Speaks, and Speaks and Speaks"

Incisor:
Whose sharp incisors have gnawed many a keel - Thomas Bailey Aldrich "Wyndham Towers"

Jaw

Kneecap:
Gravity breaking our kneecaps - Ocean Vuong "Eurydice"

Marrow

Marrow-Bone:
From our marrow-bone bodies - Diane Mehta "Gala Noise"

Milk Teeth:
Milk teeth sharpening a father's heart - Sahar Muradi "All I can see is nothing"

Rib.

Rib Cage:
My rib cage expanding and contracting in iambics - Daisy Aldan "Everywhere in Constancy, He Is Intoning, Look! Look!"

His ribcage filled with tiny boats - Angela Liu "An Interrogation About a Monster During Sleep Paralysis"

Shoulder Blade:
an industry of inertia in their shoulder blades - Jayson P. Smith "on fathers & swords"

Skeleton.

Skull

Spine

Teeth/Tooth.

Vertebrae.

Wishbone:
The horizon's wishbone snaps - Cynthia Zarin "Still Life (For Rose)"

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