Proto-sf-adjacent poetry published during the genre’s emergent Radium Age (c. 1900–1935). Research and selection (2022–ongoing), plus eccentric/evolving categorization effort (2025–ongoing), by HILOBROW’s Josh Glenn. A new installment in the RADIUM AGE POETRY series will appear every five days through — based on Josh’s ongoing research, which as of this writing (4/26) has turned up over 500 proto-sf-adjacent poems — late 2029.
Also see: RADIUM AGE ART (“Ut pictura poesis”) | RADIUM AGE TIMELINE | MIT PRESS RADIUM AGE series info.
SF theorists such as Darko Suvin and Fredric Jameson would have us understand that the novum — the central, scientifically plausible innovation or drastic disruption (such as a technology, alien, or social structure) that differentiates a (bold, truly innovative) sf world from its (bold, truly innovative) author’s empirical reality — is so inexplicably bizarre that it causes “cognitive estrangement.” Because our un-estranged imaginations are trapped within the ideological constraints of the present system, the novum cannot be directly represented or written about in a conventional, realistic manner. The best science fiction, claims Jameson, demonstrates and dramatizes our current “incapacity to imagine the future”; it succeeds through failure. The same is true, he writes, of avant-garde art. Only through “disruptive” avant-garde forms can we challenge the structural constraints that keep us from thinking differently.
I describe the works in this collection as “proto-sf-adjacent poems.” That’s because I think of “[proto-] science fiction poems” as being the sort of thing published in sf pulps, and/or written by sf authors. (Fans of my Radium Age reissue project already know that I describe science fiction from the genre’s emergent 1900–1935 era as “proto” because the term “science fiction” wasn’t popularized until 1929.) There are several examples of proto-sf poems on this page. Leland S. Copeland, for example, was the first poet to have his works appear in the first sf magazine (Gernsback’s Amazing Stories). Proto-sf authors whose poems are listed on this page, meanwhile, include Valery Bryusov, Karel Čapek, Stanley G. Weinbaum, Frederik Pohl, Clark Ashton Smith, Eric Temple Bell, Olaf Stapledon, Aldous Huxley, and C.S. Lewis.
You’ll also find collected here a number of science- and mathematics-related poems by Frederick Soddy (the radiochemist and popularizer of the new understanding of radioactivity), A.S. Eddington (the astrophysicist and mathematician who announced and explained Einstein’s theory of general relativity to the English-speaking world), Julian Huxley (evolutionary biologist, eugenicist, brother of Aldous), and other scientists and mathematicians. As well as numerous poems about mathematics and geometry, new technologies, and the thrilling, troubling discoveries of Einstein and Curie, et al., by laypersons, often writing for newspapers.
Fun stuff! But there are plenty of anthologies out there collecting these sorts of “science fiction poems” and poems about science. My poetry research project is broader in scope.
What I’m particularly fascinated by are all the other poems you’ll find collected here: traditional and avant-garde poems that explore much the same themes — including dystopia and utopia, far-out mathematics and the fourth dimension, Afro-futurism, catastrophe, future war, new technologies, scientific breakthrough, dehumanization, cosmic awe, disenchantment and unseen forces — that proto-sf authors were exploring during the genre’s Radium Age era. Poems written by Futurists (Italian and otherwise), of course, but also by the likes of Langston Hughes, D.H. Lawrence, William Butler Yeats, T.S. Eliot, Archibald MacLeish, Wallace Stevens, Amy Lowell, W.H. Auden, Lola Ridge, William Empson, Harriet Monroe, Hart Crane, Stephen Spender, Robinson Jeffers, Jean Toomer, and Mina Loy. If nothing else, this project of mine has driven me to take a deep dive into early twentieth-century poetry, which has proven enlightening and enjoyable.
Speaking of Mina Loy, Michael Golston’s The Science Fiction of Poetics and the Avant-Garde Imagination suggests that Loy’s “Human Cylinders” (1915), with its panting “automatons” coupling in “the enervating dusk,” may be “the first true sci-fi poem.” One would have to carefully delineate one’s categories, of course, to settle this argument definitively. Loy’s extraordinary poem could be plotted near the center of the “proto sf poems” / “proto-sf-adjacent poems” Venn diagram, and perhaps this is what Golston means. However, Marinetti’s “To My Pegasus” (1908), Lewis Milligan’s “The Super-Man” (1910), and Maurice N. Corbett’s “Black Kingdoms of the Future” (1914), among others, also probably play in that same space. And speaking of mechanized humanoids, one must compare Loy’s poem with Randolph Bourne’s “Sabotage” (1912), Jessica Dismorr’s “Monologue” (1915), and Álvaro de Campos [Fernando Pessoa]’s “Time’s Passage” (c. 1914–18). Which is not an onerous chore, by the way: these poems are smart, funny, weird, ominous, exciting, and hopeful.
Perhaps, after doing the necessary research and reading, and making close comparisons, and defining our categories, we’ll agree with Golston that “Human Cylinders” is “the first true sci-fi poem.” I’d be perfectly OK with that outcome! My goal, with this project, is about providing additional context for the Radium Age proto-sf stories I’ve been researching and promoting for two decades now. If we make a close study of the poems collected here (not to mention the fine art collected here) side-by-side with proto-sf stories from the Radium Age, we’ll gain unique insights into both. Let’s do this!
“Her long lost science, wealth and fame, / Dark Ethiopia will reclaim.” — Maurice N. Corbett
Radium Age AFROFUTURISM poems include…
ADAPTATION & HYBRIDITY: 1914–1923 Georgia Douglas Johnson’s COSMOPOLITE (1922) | Jean Toomer’s HER LIPS ARE COPPER WIRE (1923). 1924–1933 James Edward McCall’s THE NEW NEGRO (c. 1927) | Edward Silvera’s INTROSPECTION (1928). *
* These could also be categorized as UNKNOWABLE ALIENS / SINGULARITY poems.
AFTER WHITE HEGEMONY: 1904–1913 Charles Bertram Johnson’s THE DREAMER (1905). 1914–1923 Maurice N. Corbett’s BLACK KINGDOMS OF THE FUTURE (1914) | Maurice N. Corbett’s THE FUTURE (1914) | Georgia Douglas Johnson’s HOPE (1917) | Claude McKay’s AMERICA (1922). 1924–1933 Langston Hughes’ I, TOO (1926) | Waring Cuney’s DUST (1927). *
* These could also be categorized as CATASTROPHE poems, in the subcategory DECLINE AND FALL OF (WHITE/WESTERN) CIVILIZATION.
BLOODY VISIONS: 1914–1923 Leslie Pinckney Hill’s ARMAGEDDON (1915) | Fenton Johnson’s TIRED (1919) | Leslie Pinckney Hill’s TO THE CHINESE (c. 1921) | Claude McKay’s TO THE INTRENCHED CLASSES (1922) | Carrie W. Clifford’s WARNING (1922) | Carrie W. Clifford’s TOMORROW (1922). 1924–1933 Angela Weld Grimké’s TENEBRIS (1927). *
* These could also be categorized as CATASTROPHE or FUTURE WAR poems.
SWEET CHARIOTS: 1904–1913 William Stanley Braithwaite’s DISTANCES (1904). 1914–1923 William Stanley Braithwaite’s DEL CASCAR (1922). *
“The idea of a space ark strongly resonated, in the 1970s, for African Americans — and for many of us, still today.” — Adrienne Crew, “Sweet Chariots”
* These could also be categorized as COSMIC AWE poems.
STAY TUNED! Maurice N. Corbett’s “A CRISIS NOW IS NEAR…” (1914) | W.E.B. Du Bois’ “BEWILDERED, WE ARE…” (1920) | Langston Hughes’ PROBLEMS (1926) | Claude McKay’s ENSLAVED (1922) | & more to come.
Some Radium Age-era poems by African American poets are included in different categories on this page, i.e., instead of this one. For a complete list of Radium Age poems (published thus far here at HILOBROW) by African American poets, visit this index page.
“Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree / If mankind perished utterly” — Sara Teasdale
Radium Age CATASTROPHE poems include…
AFTER WHITE HEGEMONY: See AFROFUTURISM.
BITE THE BULLET: See FUTURE WAR.
BLOODY VISIONS: See AFROFUTURISM.
DECLINE & FALL OF (WHITE/WESTERN) CIVILIZATION: Valery Bryusov’s THE DAYS SHALL COME OF FINAL DESOLATION (1899) | G.K. Chesterton’s KING’S CROSS STATION (1900). 1904–1913 Valery Bryusov’s THE COMING HUNS (1904–05). 1914–1923 Amy Lowell’s THE CYCLISTS (1914) | Osbert Sitwell’s THE END (1917) | Sara Teasdale’s “THERE WILL COME SOFT RAINS” (1918) | Vladimir Mayakovsky’s OUR MARCH (1918) | Eve Brodlique Summers’ OF RUINED CITIES (1919) | William Butler Yeats’ THE SECOND COMING (1920) | D.H. Lawrence’s THE REVOLUTIONARY (1921) | Lee Wilson Dodd’s VACUUM (1923) | Louis Ginsberg’s WATERFALLS OF STONE (1923) | Mykola Bazhan’s ZURMA SWARM (1923). 1924–1933 Robinson Jeffers’ SHINE, PERISHING REPUBLIC (1925) | T.S. Eliot’s THE HOLLOW MEN (1925) | D.H. Lawrence’s TO LET GO OR TO HOLD ON —? (1929) | Archibald MacLeish’s EPISTLE TO BE LEFT TO THE EARTH (1930) | D.H. Lawrence’s THE TRIUMPH OF THE MACHINE (1932) | John Lehmann’s THIS EXCELLENT MACHINE (1932) | Kochia Tseng’s FIRE IN THE SKY (1932). ALSO: Louis MacNeice’s AN ECLOGUE FOR CHRISTMAS (1934) | Karel Čapek’s WHAT OUR AGE HAS DONE (1936) | Wallace Stevens’ A POSTCARD FROM THE VOLCANO (1936) | John Peale Bishop’s THE RETURN (c. 1936). *
* These could be sub-categorized into the various causes of (white/western) civilization’s decline and fall.
DEEP TIME: See COSMIC AWE.
DYING EARTH (or DEAD MOON): 1904–1913 John Davidson’s “EARTH ALREADY TO ITS DOOM…” (1904) | Georg Heym’s UMBRA VITAE (1912) | Maximilian Voloshin’s SONNET XV (1913). 1914–1923 Robert Frost’s FIRE AND ICE (1920) | F.V. Branford’s THE MOON (1922) | Stanley G. Weinbaum’s TWO SUNSETS (1922). 1924–1933 Archibald MacLeish’s THE END OF THE WORLD (1926) | Julian Huxley’s COSMIC DEATH (1932) | Ralph Milne Farley’s THE END OF THE WORLD (1933). ALSO: Robinson Jeffers’ NOVA (c. 1935–38) | Frederik Pohl’s ELEGY TO A DEAD PLANET: LUNA (1937). *
* These could also be categorized as COSMIC AWE poems.
DIRTY OLD TOWN: See DYSTOPIA / UTOPIA.
ECO-CATASTROPHE / PANDEMIC: 1904–1913 Lucian B. Watkins’ SAN FRANCISCO’S 18th OF APRIL (1906) (1907) | Jakob van Hoddis’ WELTENDE (1911) | Amy Lowell’s “IF A SAND-STORM WOULD COME…” (1919). 1924–1933 Claude McKay’s DESOLATE (1926) | Stephen Vincent Benét’s METROPOLITAN NIGHTMARE (1927?) | W.H. Auden’s GARE DU MIDI (c. 1930).
OVERREACH: See SCIENTIFIC BREAKTHROUGH.
STAY TUNED! Ambrose Beirce’s THE PASSING SHOW | Vladimir Mayakovsky’s GREAT BIG HELL OF A CITY | Clark Ashton Smith’s AFTER ARMAGEDDON. & more to come.
“I am treading / Cold space — the vast void — the dim ether.” — Andrey Bely
Radium Age COSMIC AWE poems include…
ATOMIC SUBLIME: See DISENCHANTMENT / UNSEEN FORCES.
DEEP TIME: 1904–1913 Ford Madox Ford’s THE MOTHER (1904) | Herman Hesse’s A SWARM OF GNATS (1911). 1914–1923 Eric Temple Bell’s “TIME IS A MARVEL…” (1916) | Paul Valéry’s THE YOUNG FATE (1917) | Sara Teasdale’s THE VOICE (1920) | Evelyn Scott’s MY CHILD (c. 1920) | Leland S. Copeland’s ASPIRATION (1922). 1924–1933 Countee Cullen’s TO LOVERS OF EARTH (1927) | Álvaro de Campos [Fernando Pessoa]’s THE TOBACCO SHOP (1928). ALSO: Robinson Jeffers’ THE PURSE SEINE. * **
* These could also be categorized as CATASTROPHE poems.
** Poems that seem to mock this trope include: 1904–1913 Ambrose Beirce’s FAME (1903)
DYING EARTH (or MOON): See CATASTROPHE.
IS THERE LIFE ON MARS: 1914–1923 Clark Ashton Smith’s THE STAR-TREADER (1912) | Valery Bryusov’s THE VOICE OF OTHER WORLDS (1917) | Inagaki Taruho’s THE MAN IN THE MOON (1923). 1924–1933 Olaf Stapledon’s “IF MAN ENCOUNTER…” (1932). *
* These could also be categorized as UNKNOWABLE ALIENS / SINGULARITY poems.
MATHEMATICAL SUBLIME: See FAR-OUT MATHEMATICS / FOURTH DIMENSION.
OVERVIEW EFFECT: James T. Franklin’s ASTRONOMY (1900). 1904–1913 William Stanley Braithwaite’s THE VISION (1911). 1914–1923 Angela Morgan’s ROOM! (1914) | Conrad Aiken’s MORNING SONG OF SENLIN (1918). 1924–1933 Andrey Bely’s EUTHANASIA (c. 1927) | Alexander Blok’s “INTO CRIMSON DARK” (c. 1927) | D.H. Lawrence’s SPACE (1929) | Olaf Stapledon’s “IS MAN A DISEASE…” (1932) | Olaf Stapledon’s “LAST NIGHT…” (1932).
STARS WHEEL IN PURPLE (PROSE): 1914–1923 Harriet Monroe’s BEYOND THE SUNS (c. 1914) | Edith Södergran’s ON FOOT I HAD TO… (c. 1920) | Don Marquis’ UNREST (c. 1919) | Alfred Noyes’ WATCHERS OF THE SKY (1922) | Leland S. Copeland’s PLANET NEPTUNE TO MOTHER SUN (1922). 1924–1933 Elinor Wylie’s ADDRESS TO MY SOUL (1928) | H.D.’s STARS WHEEL IN PURPLE (1931) | C. Day Lewis’ “DOWN HIDDEN CAUSEWAYS…” (1931). *
* Poems that seem to mock this trope include: 1904–1913 Anonymous’ ASTRONOMIC JOSH (1908). 1914–1923 Irma Valeria’s LET’S LAUGH AT THE UNIVERSE (1917) | Kenneth Rexroth’s “HEAVEN IS FULL OF DEFINITE STARS…” (w. 1920–25). 1924–1933 William Empson’s LETTER I (c. 1930). ALSO: Robert Frost’s DESERT PLACES (1934).
SWEET CHARIOTS: See AFROFUTURISM.
STAY TUNED! Valery Bryusov’s CHILDHOOD FANCIES | Herbert Read’s MUTATIONS OF THE PHŒNIX | Michael Roberts’ MIDNIGHT | & more to come.
“the modern man in the street / is a robot” — D.H. Lawrence
Radium Age DEHUMANIZATION poems include…
CYBORG MANIFESTO: 1904–1913 Randolph Bourne’s SABOTAGE (1912). 1914–1923 Jessica Dismorr’s MONOLOGUE (1915) | Álvaro de Campos [Fernando Pessoa]’s TIME’S PASSAGE (c. 1914–18) | Mina Loy’s HUMAN CYLINDERS (c. 1917). 1924–1933 e.e. cummings’ “SHE BEING BRAND/-NEW” (1926) | D.H. Lawrence’s ROBOT FEELINGS (1932). *
* These could also be categorized as NEW TECHNOLOGIES and/or UNKNOWABLE ALIENS / SINGULARITY poems.
MECHANIZATION: 1914–1923 Lola Ridge’s “SADIE QUIVERS LIKE A ROD…” (1918) | Carl Sandburg’s MANUAL SYSTEM (1920) | Lola Ridge’s REVEILLE (1920) | T.S. Eliot’s “AT THE VIOLET HOUR…” (1922). 1924–1933 D.H. Lawrence’s LET US BE MEN (1929) | D.H. Lawrence’s DARK SATANIC MILLS (1932) | D.H. Lawrence’s THE GULF (1932) | D.H. Lawrence’s MAN AND MACHINE (1932) | D.H. Lawrence’s HOLD BACK! (1932). ALSO: Carl Sandburg’s “THE MAN IN THE STREET IS FED…” (p. 1936) | Amy Lowell’s A COMPARISON (date unclear).
THINGS ARE IN THE SADDLE: See NEW TECHNOLOGIES.
STAY TUNED! W.W. Gibson’s THE MACHINE | D.H. Lawrence’s MEN LIKE GODS | Armando Mazza’s TORMENTS | & more to come.
“Rock is a shivering miracle…” — Michael Roberts
Radium Age DISENCHANTMENT / UNSEEN FORCES poems include…
ANTHROPIC PRINCIPLE: Aldous Huxley’s FIFTH PHILOSOPHER’S SONG.
ATOMIC SUBLIME: George Sterling’s THE TESTIMONY OF THE SUNS (1903). 1904–1913 John Davidson’s “MATTER INCANDESCENT” (1904) | Clark Ashton Smith’s THE NEMESIS OF SUNS (1912). 1914–1923 Eva Amendola Kühn’s “COSMIC FORCES…” (1917) | Thomas Thornely’s THE ATOM (1921) | F.V. Branford’s MASTER CELLS (1922). 1924–1933 Michael Roberts’ ROCKS ARE IMMUTABLE (1930). *
* These could also be categorized as COSMIC AWE poems.
GEOPHYSICAL SUBLIME: See SCIENTIFIC BREAKTHROUGHS.
MICROSCOPIC SUBLIME: See SCIENTIFIC BREAKTHROUGHS.
SCIENCE FANTASY: 1904–1913 Filippo Tommaso Marinetti’s TO MY PEGASUS (1908).
SOUL SEARCHING: 1904–1913 Ford Madox Ford’s GREY MATTER (1904). 1914–1923 Zora Neale Hurston’s PASSION (1922) | Herbert Read’s EQUATION (1923). 1924–1933 Walter Lowenfels’ APOLLINAIRE AN ELEGY (1930). *
* Poems that seem to mock this trope include: H.L. Mencken’s A BALLAD OF LOOKING (1903) 1924–1933 Thomas Hardy’s EPITAPH FOR G.K. CHESTERTON (1928).
TECHNOLOGICAL SUBLIME: See NEW TECHNOLOGIES.
STAY TUNED! T.E. Hulme’s CINDERS | Herbert Read’s THE RETREAT | & more to come.
“A silver Lucifer / serves / cocaine in cornucopia…” — Mina Loy
Radium Age DYSTOPIA / UTOPIA poems include…
BIG ROCK CANDY MOUNTAIN: 1914–1923 Mina Loy’s LUNAR BAEDEKER (1923).
BRAVE NEW WORLD: 1914–1923 D.H. Lawrence’s SUBURBS ON A HAZY DAY (c. 1913–28) | Eric Temple Bell’s THE GIANT (1916) | D.H. Lawrence’s THE EVENING LAND (1922). 1924–1933 Joaquín Pasos’ NORWAY (w. 1929) | George William Russell’s THE CITIES (1930). ALSO: Robinson Jeffers’ AVE CAESAR (1935).
DIRTY OLD TOWN: 1914–1923 Johannes R. Becher’s BERLIN (1914) | H.D.’s CITIES (1916) | Evelyn Scott’s THE CITY AT NIGHT (1920) | Anna Akhmatova’s “ALL IS SOLD, ALL IS LOST” (1921) | T.S. Eliot’s “WHAT IS THAT SOUND…” (1922). *
* These could also be categorized as CATASTROPHE poems.
FROM EACH ACCORDING TO HIS ABILITIES: 1914–1923 Aleksei Gastev’s FACTORY WHISTLES (1918). *
* Poems that seem to mock this trope include: 1904–1913 Rudyard Kipling’s MACDONOUGH’S SONG (1912). 1914–1923 Wallace Stevens’ THE IDEA OF A COLONY (1923) | C.S. Lewis’ DYMER (1926).
“Out of the tensor Gμν / Hamilton built the world anew.” — W.H. Auden
Radium Age FAR-OUT MATHEMATICS / FOURTH DIMENSION poems include…
MATHEMATICAL SUBLIME: 1904–1913 Valery Bryusov’s NUMBERS (1913). 1914–1923 Laurence Binyon’s NUMBERS (1919) | F.V. Branford’s FAREWELL TO MATHEMATICS (1919) | Velimir Khlebnikov’s “THERE IS THAT SMELL…” (1922). 1924–1933 Farfa’s THE MECHANICAL TRIANGLE (1933). *
Kant’s Critique of Judgment distinguishes “a dynamic sublime,” found in power and turbulence, from “a mathematical sublime,” where vastness stretches without limit.
* These could also be categorized as DISENCHANTMENT / UNSEEN FORCES poems.
NON-EUCLIDEAN GEOMETRY: 1914–1923 Gertrude Stein’s A CARAFE, THAT IS A BLIND GLASS (1914) | Amy Lowell’s MIDDAY AND AFTERNOON (1916) | Babette Deutsch’s FOURTH DIMENSION (1921). 1924–1933 Archibald MacLeish’s SIGNATURE FOR TEMPO (1926) | W.H. Auden’s IN THE LAST OF THE OLD YEAR (w. 1926/27) | William Empson’s THE WORLD’S END (1928).
POETRY OF LOGICAL IDEAS: 1914–1923 Edna St. Vincent Millay’s EUCLID ALONE (1922). 1924–1933 Michael Roberts’ PERSPECTIVE (1930). ALSO: Frederick Soddy’s THE KISS PRECISE (1936). *
“Pure mathematics is, in its way, the poetry of logical ideas.” — Albert Einstein
* Poems that seem to mock this trope include: 1914–1923 Vachel Lindsay’s EUCLID (1914) | Wallace Stevens’ “RATIONALISTS, WEARING SQUARE HATS” (1923). 1924–1933 Emil Raymond’s REFRACTION OF LIGHT (1924) | Emma Rounds’ PLANE GEOMETRY (1925).
QUANTUM SUBLIME: See SCIENTIFIC BREAKTHROUGH.
STAY TUNED! Louis MacNeice’s REFLECTIONS | Max Weber’s THE EYE MOMENT | Lionel Wiggam’s MATHEMATICS | & more to come.
“The Zeppelins that came to bomb Paris always came from Orion” — Blaise Cendrars
Radium Age FUTURE WAR poems include…
BITE THE BULLET: 1904–1913 J. Lewis Milligan’s THE SUPER-MAN (1910). 1914–1923 Robert Grant’s THE SUPERMAN (c. 1917) | Guillaume Apollinaire’s THE LITTLE CAR (1918). 1924–1933 Wen Yiduo’s IMPRESSIONS OF AN EARLY SUMMER NIGHT (1928) | D.H. Lawrence’s FUTURE WAR (c. 1930). *
* These could also be categorized as CATASTROPHE poems. The superhuman-themed poems could be categorized as UNKNOWABLE ALIEN / SINGULARITY.
BLOODY VISIONS: See AFROFUTURISM.
DEATH FROM ABOVE: 1904–1913 Charles M. Doughty’s THE CLIFFS (1909). 1914–1923 Amy Lowell’s VENICE AGAIN (1918) | D.H. Lawrence’s BOMBARDMENT (1919) | Nancy Cunard’s ZEPPELINS (1921) | Hirato Renkichi’s HOT-BLAST (before 1922). 1924–1933 Mykola Bazhan’s AERO-MARCH (c. 1923–27) | Blaise Cendrars’ ORION (1928).
WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION: 1914–1923 Rudyard Kipling’s THE TRADE (1916) | Amy Lowell’s CAMOUFLAGED TROOP SHIP (1919). 1924–1933 Hirato Renkichi’s POEM OF DIRECTNESS (before 1931).
STAY TUNED! Laurence Binyon’s THE ZEPPELIN | Enrico Cavacchioli’s THE MISSILE | Filippo Tommaso Marinetti’s BOMBARDMENT | & more to come.
“multiple retort underfeed stoker / balanced seatless blow-off valve” — Walter Lowenfels
Radium Age NEW TECHNOLOGIES poems include…
CYBORG MANIFESTO: See DEHUMANIZATON.
PLANES, TRAINS, AND AUTOMOBILES: Max Jacob’s INVITATION TO A VOYAGE (1903). 1904–1913 Percy MacKaye’s THE AUTOMOBILE (1912) | Blaise Cendrars’ “…I’M ON THE WAY” (1913). 1914–1923 Jerzy Jankowski’s THE CONFLAGRATION OF A FLIER (1914). 1924–1933 Zhimo Xu’s NIGHT TRAIN (c. 1929) | Julia Boynton Green’s THE EVOLUTION OF AN ACE (1931). ALSO: Adele Gloria’s EXPRESS TRAIN NO. 89 (1934) | C. Day Lewis’ “AIR WAS ALL AMBUSHES” (1935).
TECHNOLOGICAL SUBLIME: Zinaida Gippius’ ELECTRICITY (1901) | W.E. Henley’s A SONG OF SPEED (1903). 1904–1913 Rudyard Kipling’s THE SECRET OF THE MACHINES (1911). 1914–1923 Harriet Monroe’s A POWER-PLANT (1914) | Harriet Monroe’s THE TELEPHONE (1914) | Harriet Monroe’s THE TURBINE (1914) | Angela Morgan’s TO-DAY (1914) | Valery Bryusov’s DUSK (c. 1917) | Lola Ridge’s “HULKS OF BLACK TURBINES…” (1918) | Vicente Huidobro’s EIFFEL TOWER (1918) | Hirato Renkichi’s MACHINE (before 1922) | Hirato Renkichi’s INSIGHT (before 1922) | Hart Crane’s LINES SENT TO ALFRED STIEGLITZ (c. 1923) | Mikhail Gerasimov’s THE FIRST BULB IS TURNED ON (1923). 1924–1933 Hart Crane’s TO BROOKLYN BRIDGE (1930) | Hirato Renkichi’s “HE DASHED THROUGH (THE WOUNDED CITY)…” (c. 1931). * **
* These could also be categorized as DISENCHANTMENT / UNSEEN FORCES poems.
** Poems that seem to mock this trope include: 1924–1933 Walter Lowenfels’ FROM AN EXPOSITION OF POWER AND INDUSTRIAL MACHINERY (1925) | Stephen Spender’s THE PYLONS (1933).
THINGS ARE IN THE SADDLE: 1904–1913 Charles Buxton Going’s THE SONG OF STEEL (1907) | Paul Zech’s FACTORY STREET BY DAY (1911). 1914–1923 Louis Untermeyer’s PORTRAIT OF A MACHINE (1922). 1924–1933 Herbert Read’s THE INNOCENT EYE (1933). *
* These could also be categorized as DEHUMANIZATION poems.
“Things are in the saddle, and ride mankind.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson.
STAY TUNED! Apollinaire’s ZONE | Margaret Ashmun’s THE GREATER POWER | Archibald Rutledge’s RADIO | Carl Sandburg’s UNDER A TELEPHONE POLE | Edith Sitwell’s THE LADY WITH THE SEWING MACHINE | & more to come.
“Science… has fallen from hope to confusion” — Robinson Jeffers
Radium Age SCIENTIFIC BREAKTHROUGH poems include…
GEOPHYSICAL SUBLIME: 1924–1933 D.H. Lawrence’s UNDERNEATH (1929). ALSO: Hugh MacDiarmid’s STONY LIMITS (1934). *
* These could also be categorized as DISENCHANTMENT / UNSEEN FORCES poems.
MICROSCOPIC SUBLIME: 1914–1923 Ronald Ross’ THE ANNIVERSARY (1917) | Angela Morgan’s TO MADAME CURIE (1922). 1924–1933 Robert Bridges’ THE TESTAMENT OF BEAUTY (1929) | D.H. Lawrence’s THE THIRD THING (1929). *
* These could also be categorized as DISENCHANTMENT / UNSEEN FORCES poems.
OVERREACH: 1914–1923 Vachel Lindsay’s THE SCIENTIFIC ASPIRATION (1920). 1924–1933 Robinson Jeffers’ SCIENCE (1925) | Archibald MacLeish’s MAN! (1926) | W.J. Turner’s MISS AMERICA (1930) | Robinson Jeffers’ TRIAD (1931–33). *
* These could also be categorized as CATASTROPHE poems.
QUANTUM SUBIME: 1914–1923 Agnes Lee’s RADIUM (1914–15) | A.S. Eddington’s ONE THING IS CERTAIN (c. 1919) | W.J. Turner’s IN TIME LIKE GLASS (c. 1921). 1924–1933 D.H. Lawrence’s RELATIVITY (1929) | Archibald MacLeish’s EINSTEIN (1929) | Michael Roberts’ NOTE ON Θ, Φ, and Ψ (c. 1930) | Michael Roberts’ SIRIUS B (1931). * **
* These could also be categorized as FAR-OUT MATHEMATICS / FOURTH DIMENSION poems.
** Poems that seem to mock this trope include: 1924–1933 Kathleen Millay’s RELATIVITY (c. 1929) | Herman Hupfeld’s AS TIME GOES BY (1931).
STATISTICS: 1914–1923 Charles Wharton Stork’s THE STATISTICIAN (1923). *
* Poems that seem to mock this trope include: A.S. Eddington’s “THERE ONCE WAS A BREATHY BABOON” (1939).
STAY TUNED! Valery Bryusov’s THREE APPLES | Robert Garioch’s TRANSLATIONS FROM AN UNWRITTEN POEM | W.W. Gibson’s WINDOWS | Robinson Jeffers’ NEW YEAR’S EVE | Julian Huxley’s TO A DANCER | D.H. Lawrence’s GIVE US GODS | Vachel Lindsay’s THE HORRID VOICE OF SCIENCE | Hugh MacDiarmid’s THALAMUS | Herbert Read’s THE ANALYSIS OF LOVE | Erwin F. Smith’s SCIENCE | John Collings Squire’s THE SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST | & more to come.
“Once out of nature I shall never take / My bodily form from any natural thing…” — W.B. Yeats
Radium Age UNKNOWABLE ALIENS / SINGULARITY poems include…
ADAPTATION & HYBRIDITY: See AFROFUTURISM.
ALIEN INVASION: 1924–1933 Robert Graves’ WELSH INCIDENT (1929).
BITE THE BULLET: See FUTURE WAR for a few superhuman-themed poems.
CYBORG MANIFESTO: See DEHUMANIZATION.
HOMO SUPERIOR: 1914–1923 Ludwig Rubiner’s THE HUMAN BEING (c. 1919) | Walter Everette Hawkins’ CREDO (c. 1920). 1924–1933 Robinson Jeffers’ ROAN STALLION (1925).
IS THERE LIFE ON MARS: See COSMIC AWE.
UPLOADED CONSCIOUSNESS / SUBLIMATION: 1914–1923 Kurt Heynicke’s HUMAN BEING (c. 1919). 1924–1933 W.B. Yeats’ SAILING TO BYZANTIUM (1928) | D.H. Lawrence’s WELLSIAN FUTURES (1929).
WATCHERS: 1904–1913 Max Beerbohm’s A SEQUELULA TO “THE DYNASTS” (1912).
“Weren’t strips of heart culture seen / Of late mating two periodicities?” — William Empson
Radium Age sf-adjacent poems that so far resist categorization include…
1904–1913 Aleksei Kruchenykh’s DYR BUL SHCHYL (1913) | Vasilisk Gnedov’s POEM OF THE END (1913) | Blaise Cendrars’ SPUTTERINGS (1913) | Vladimir Mayakovsky’s FROM “I” (1913). 1914–1923 Pierre Drieu de la Rochelle’s ROUNDNESS (1917) | Marianne Moore’s IN THE DAYS OF PRISMATIC COLOR (1919) | Clark Ashton Smith’s AFTERWARDS (1923). 1924–1933 Kenneth Rexroth’s “FROM ANY EVENT INTERVALS…” (w. 1920s) | Max Jacob’s HELL IS GRADUATED (1924) | Hugh MacDiarmid’s A DRUNK MAN LOOKS AT THE THISTLE (1926) | Aleksei Kruchenykh’s “I FRIED MY BRAIN…” (1926) | William Empson’s INVITATION TO JUNO (1928) | C. Day Lewis’ TRANSITIONAL POEM (1929)
STAY TUNED! | W.W. Gibson’s FLANNAN ISLE | Igor Severyanin’s STRANGE | & more to come.