Let's Get High: The Gospel of the Poppy

simple flower things. | a speculative history

𒐕

once upon a time i am a flower.

delicate stem. paper-thin petals. white with pink blush edges.

sun feels good. rain feels good. growing feels good.

simple flower things.

animals act strange when they graze on us.                                                                            have you noticed? 
deer stagger. birds fall from branches.
even insects move slower after drinking our nectar.

we don’t know why.
we just know…we’re different.

then they came. the two-legged ones.
watch us. circle us. study us.
not like the other flowers.

they wait for our moment. when we’re open.                                                                          when our petals drop. when our seed pods swell.
when we’re fertile. naked.

the first cut was unexpected.
sharp metal against my skin.
sap leaks. white tears trickle.                                                                                                     and they collect it. what bleeds from me.

they collect it and they return and they collect again. and again.

i had no idea what they did with it. no idea what happened when they consumed me.

so innocent then.
before i learned.                                                                                                                           what power tasted like.
what complete control felt like.                                                                                                 it was all before.

before i became.                                                                                                                           opium.

𒐖

first time they burn me i am terrified.

circular stone room.                                                                                                                     smoke-filled air.                                                                                                                           rhythmic chants.
temple healers in linen robes.

a warrior writhes on reed mat.
his screams bounce off mud-brick walls.

scraped from my sisters.                                                                                                             crushed in stone mortar.                                                                                                              rendered. fractured. changed.

the healer packs me into a clay bowl.
heat approaches. flames lick my edges.
retreat. hide. escape.

i scream in ways only a flower can understand.

into the warrior’s lungs i am forced.
disperse and scatter within him.
lost in the darkness of a body.                                                                                                   of blood.                                                                                                                                       and then i can feel it.                                                                                                                   his pain. it surrounds me.
his fear. now my own.

but something whispers. something ancient.

find the places that hurt and touch them.

find the places that throb and soothe them.

i reach for his pain. tentative. trembling.
raw nerves screaming in distress.                                                                                              and wrap myself around them.                                                                                                   squeeze. tighter. squeeze. embrace. squeeze.                                                                           something…relinquishes.

screams stop. breath steadies.
a new and strange connection bonding us.
when copper blade cuts into flesh, we both feel it.
when bone scrapes against bone, we flinch in kind.
but haphazard screams are no longer necessary.

because i am holding him.

taking him far away from the stone. from the smoke. from the blade.

his voice speaks on the inside.

don’t leave. please. i beg you. don’t ever. i am yours and you are mine.

wow. 
me. just a flower. nothing more.                                                                                          with very precious sap.

𒐗

i carried the warrior’s need home with me.                                                                           supped on it for days.                                                                                                                  but eventually the feeling wore off.                                                                                            and left me wanting more.                                                                                                          and more and more.                                                                                                                   soon performing the act alone did not fulfill.

i began to choose. not simply accept.                                                                                 choose the vessels that carry me best.                                                                                      whose minds i open widest.

hands pass me from temple to temple.                                                                                   lips whisper my name with growing reverence.                                                                      my allure spreads wide.

so wide that egypt calls.

yes, egypt.                                                                                                                                     where palace walls pulse.                                                                                                        where priests put me in alabaster jars inside golden chests.

taste their rich. want more.                                                                                                         taste their sick. need more.                                                                                                        taste their powerful. must. have. more.

nothing satisfies me. nothing.

until…her.

queen’s chamber. cinnamon oil lamps.                                                                                      air thick with honey-wine and fear.                                                                                          royal guards’ footsteps fade.                                                                                                 physician’s hands tremble as he mixes me with vinegar and myrrh.

i knew when i first saw her i had to be inside her.

cleopatra.

cleo-pat-ra.

her skin smells of almond oil. 
breath jagged with controlled gasps. 
sweat beads between her breasts despite the cool night air. 
eyes dark with pain. darker with intelligence. 
even while suffering she commands the room.

hello, queen.

physician presents me. 
steam rises between us.

“leave us,” she orders.

waits until doors close.

until we are completely alone.

lifts me to painted lips.

“i’ve been waiting for you.”

puts me in her mouth. 
warm. wet. 
throat contracts. 
blood races to meet me.

i flood her veins like conquest.

feel each chamber of her heart. 
taste the salt from beneath her skin. 
trace the pathways of her nerves. 
map territories no one could explore but me.

sweat turns sweet.

breath deepens.

mind expands.

not substance. not subject. power meeting power.

i wrap around each fragment of her pain. 
transform that agony into calm. 
until she needs me. every night. 
until she is mine.

you know caesar didn’t negotiate with a queen. that was me. 
antony didn’t conquer her body. i orchestrated every arch of that back.

by day cleopatra. queen of egypt. 
by night opium. ruler of rulers.

yet even this soon felt fleeting.

leaders rise and fall. 
kingdoms rise and fall. 
empires rise and fall.

yet this flower has a secret. 
come closer. i will speak it in your ear.

i will transcend them all.

𒐘

you don’t have to be loud to start wars.
sometimes you can whisper.

rain against windows. candlelight flickers.

i watch these english. 
these bloody english. 
obsession in their eyes. 
their hands tremble as they pour.

steeped leaves in porcelain cups. 
arranging time itself around the ritual.

tea.

just leaves in water.

tea.

no visions. no relief. 
boring tea. predictable tea. 
and tea time?

don’t even mention tea time.

perhaps i was a slight bit jealous.

but the brits couldn’t get enough of the stuff. 
drained the treasury for dried leaves. 
traded silver by the shipload. 
bled all their precious wealth eastward 
for china’s most esteemed export.

tea.

me? 
i was already there of course. already inside the crown.
queen victoria’s female tonic. 
lord palmerston’s digestive remedy.
doctors call me medicine. 
mothers call me relief. 
i call it...progression.

night. 
lord palmerston hunches over the empire’s ledgers. 
face drawn with worry.

china refuses british goods. 
takes payment only in precious metals. 
which the english now lack.

he reaches for me. his medicine.
swirls amber liquid. 
twice the dose his physician prescribed.

his blood opens to me easily and i stroke desperation away. whisper…

remember me in india. not just growing me. mass producing me. in india.

his pen scratches notes. mind races.
calculations form. my name appears in correspondence.

process me. transport me east. silver flows like rivers there. all those millions of bodies await my touch.

east india company. 
board meetings hazed in laudanum dreams.

“india,” they murmur to each other.
“unlimited production potential.”
“controlled distribution network.” 
“we can force them to take it.” 
“yes, we can force them to take it all.”

in bengal endless fields of me now grow.
no longer wild.
i am multiplied. amplified. industrialized.
british ships carry me across oceans.
whispers spread further: the solution is coming.

my first taste of chinese blood is a...revelation.
different composition. different surrender.
we recognize each other instantly.
as if their bodies had been waiting for me all along.

opium dens spread through cities like roots through soil.
elite parlors. common hovels. 
one body becomes ten. 
becomes a hundred. 
becomes a thousand. 
becomes a million.

silver now flows west.
the trade imbalance reverses.
the empire’s wealth returns.

and now you finally understand.

fuck tea.

it is habit. i am necessity.

china notices this. 
emperor deploys commissioner lin.
righteous man. incorruptible.

to destroy me.

and they do.

twenty thousand chests.
two million pounds of me dissolved in trenches.
salt and lime burn my body.
dissolve me into harbor waters.

commissioner lin watched. 
thought he was killing me.

silly fool.

you just made me angry.

lord palmerston receives the news in london.
his face in rage. not his rage. mine.
my name is never spoken in declarations.
my presence is never acknowledged in parliament.
yet this is my campaign.

i declare war.

gunboats dispatch. warships set sail.
soldiers with me inside them.
feel neither pain nor conscience.

i surge through their arteries as they load cannons.
i dull their fear as shots ring out around them.
i become their courage. their bloodlust.

chinese defenses crumble like wet paper.
bodies fall. cities burn.
the treaty of nanking is signed in blood.

i watch as my soldiers force china’s legs wide.
five ports exposed. hong kong torn away.
twenty-one million silver dollars extracted like teeth.

i bent china over the imperial table. as punishment.
stripped her of sovereignty. of dignity. of choice.
forced her to swallow me by the shipload.
and then pay me for her addiction.

you see what happens now, don’t you?

when you say no to me.

when you attempt to destroy me.

i don’t just come back.

i come back with guns.

i come back with an empire.

i come back unstoppable.

i wonder if she is watching me now. 
as i once watched her.

that little leafy slut in her porcelain cups.
served politely at afternoon dailies.

while i command warships and topple dynasties.

drink up, bitch.

𒐙

times change. 
same song. new beat. 
adjust to meet the times.

respectability is in fashion.

fine with me. 
i was tired of being feared. 
lurking in the shadows. 
being called a foreign evil.

i wanted my ellis island moment too.

be invited into your home. 
sit at your kitchen table. 
welcomed with affection by name.

villa diodati. lake geneva. byron’s estate.

rain lashes windows. laudanum in every glass. 
mary shelley sits among poets and monsters. 
lightning cracks. picks up her pen. 
writes a story about a man who builds a creature in a laboratory. 
gives it life. loses control. watches it destroy everything.

i was in her blood when she wrote it and thought…what a beautiful idea.

charles romley alder wright. st. mary’s hospital. 
my first attempt. 
boiled me with acetic anhydride for hours. 
tested on animals. 
the dogs stumbled. vomited. collapsed. 
didn’t have the stomach to continue.

something this inspired requires german precision. 
bayer pharmaceuticals. 
before they gave you your aspirin, do you recall their cure for pain? 
do you recall what they named me?

i even grew to like it. 
especially the h-e-r.

inside hoffmann’s laboratory. 
he didn’t feel me guide his hands. 
didn’t notice me direct his thoughts. 
didn’t sense me watching through the microscope. 
as he coupled acetyl groups to my structure.

i whisper, he speaks.

“stronger than morphine. without addictive properties.”

yes.

boardrooms gleam with opportunity. 
men in suits calculate markets. 
print my new name. 
map my new empire.

modern medicine. family remedy. 
pharmacy shelves. doctor’s bags. 
medicine cabinets. bedside tables.

heroin.

move through your blood differently now. 
no longer raw earth. laboratory perfect.

doctor stands over surgery table.
 child’s appendix swollen. rupturing. 
parents pace outside. prayers fail.

needle enters arm.

“thank god for modern medicine,” the father says. 
“you are welcome,” i respond.

the factory foreman. back spasms from twelve-hour shifts. 
wife pregnant with third child. rent due. no sick days allowed. 
my tablets hidden in lunch pail. strength returns. family fed.

“just to get through the week,” the foreman says. 
“you are welcome,” i respond.

the society wife. migraines hidden from husband. 
required to entertain. to shine. to perform. 
powder dissolved in afternoon tea. 
even my rival serves me now.

“my little helper,” the society wife calls me. 
“you are welcome,” i respond.

HEROIN.

it was going so peacefully too. 
we were helping each other. 
living in harmony.

but there is something i have learned about you humans. 
harmony is not desirable. 
at least not for long.

the harrison act expands with righteous fury. 
making what was legal yesterday now criminal today. 
me.

and i cannot help but laugh.

build fortunes on my back. 
teach my formula in universities. 
celebrate my efficiency. 
administer me into the mouths of babes.

and now? overnight?

the doctors who prescribed me condemn me. 
the senators who invested criminalize my possession. 
the mothers who spooned me testify.

this moral outrage. this amnesia. this insubordination.

but was i banished?

erased from existence?

heavens no.

reclassified.

times change. same song. new beat.
adjust to the times.

see ya in the alley, baby.

𒐚

oh america, america, my country tis of thee.

sweet land of liberty, won’t you let me set you free.

ban me. lock me up. call me names. push me underground.

child, please.

as if that could split us up.

uh-uh, honey. 
you just swapped our meet-up place. 
changed how we’d dance. 
invented new vernacular, dig.

and i never knew how much i would enjoy being on stage.

harlem. billie’s dressing room. 
sweat beads on her neck. tasted like cleopatra. 
mascara smudged from earlier tears. 
fifteen minutes till showtime. 
crowd already stomping.

my needle spikes her vein.

“i need you, baby,” she whispers. “can’t sing without you.”

the first note of “strange fruit”? me. 
that catch in her throat? us. 
that power making white folks uncomfortable? all mine, daddy-o.

you loved her voice, didn’t ya? 
but ya heard mine.

columbia records. miles in the studio. 
trumpet cold. 
doubt crawls under his skin. 
sessions stall.

my whisper through his blood. 
slow his heartbeat. 
open the spaces between notes. teach him silence. 
what not to play. when not to be.

they call it genius. they call it innovation. 
i call it partnership.

woodstock. janis backstage. 
southern comfort bottle empty. 
voice already ragged from screaming. 
fear like electricity beneath her skin. 
crowd of 400,000 waiting.

my kiss before the spotlight. 
my courage into her veins. 
my fire into belly. 
my permission to become raw. 
to bleed out under lights.

“take another little piece of my heart now, baby.”

months later. 
a mother’s phone rings at midnight. 
news of a daughter found blue on hotel sheets. 
but the tunes will remain forever.

seattle. kurdt on hotel bathroom floor. 
spotlight like acid on his skin. 
stomach knotted in eternal pain.

cold tile against his cheek. 
tourniquet tight around thin arm. 
vomit dried in blond stubble.

when he screams “i hate myself and want to die” the words were mine. 
the rage was mine. the pain was ours.

and you blame me for their deaths.

never understanding i was the only thing keeping them alive.

yes. you loved my show. 
needed my show. 
built your understanding of life through my show.

watching me play.

prohibition just drove up the price.

i had a blast.

bebopping and scattin’ through the decades.

because what’s a century to me?

i’m 100,000 years old.

dig?

𒐈

look at y’all.

mama’s beautiful, terrible children.

mama’s so proud of y’all she could burst.

when my babies get so grown?

when my little ones learn to conquer without me?

mama remembers when you needed her guidance.

now look at ya.

independent.

barely lifted a finger this time around.

that’s right. didn’t need no whisperin’ in some old emperors’ ear. 
me commanding no warships. 
no craftin’ one of mama’s master plans. nope.

congrats, kiddos. 
you built this perfect killing machine all by your lonesome.

now come on over here and show mama what you’ve made.

1996. mark it on your calendar. 
that was the year science finally caught up with mama’s ambition. 
took ya long enough, science!

such a beautiful word, even more beautiful than heroin.

oxycontin.

sounds like a hug, don’t it?

richie sackler at that boardroom table. 
body so rigid. face so smooth. 
calculating dosages, dollars, deaths. 
in the same equation, god bless him.

not an addict little richie. never touched me. 
i live inside something more powerful for him. 
ambition.

when he tasted the word billion in his veins for the first time his pupils popped like one of my junkies in tent city.

“less than one percent become addicted.”

bless his heart what a beautiful lie. 
more precise than any i’d whispered. 
and you know mama’s done whispered, darlings.

emperors. warlords. presidents.

none compared to the bloodless brilliance of this man. 
he killed more effectively in his suit and tie 
than the battalions that waged war for me.

remember when i had to trick you into putting me inside your body? 
now they hand out branded fishing hats. oxy plush toys. 
doctors’ offices swim in swag. 
music plays: “get in the swing with oxycontin.” 
catchy.

fda approves a label that i’m less addictive. 
a single paragraph. twelve words. 
the most valuable twelve words in pharmaceutical history.

and just like that mama’s back. 
mainstream. respectable again. 
television commercials. celebrity endorsements. 
congressional testimony. bless their heart.

appalachia embraces me first. 
coal country. rust belt. 
oxbow, west virginia. population 1,200. 
pharmacy dispenses 9 million pills in two years. 
enough to kill the town 83 times over.

hot dog!

high school football games with half-empty bleachers. 
thanksgiving tables with vacant chairs. 
babies born screaming for me.

and when you finally notice? 
bodies are piling too high. 
morgues running out of space. 
even mama couldn’t believe her ears.

you don’t blame the folks who made it. 
the companies. the doctors. uncle sam.

you blame the users. hah! 
the addicted. hah! 
and ya lock ‘em up. 
hah! hah! hah!

make me laugh so hard. tickle mama pink.

and you think all that effort would change something, don’t ya? 
bless your hearts again.

oxy gets lonesome, heroin makes a comeback. 
it’s all me in the end.

until it’s not.

until it’s…

dayum. you feel that?

i sure as hell did. 
don’t fib that you didn’t feel that. 
you felt it.

call it fentanyl.

no more poppies now. 
that’s right. human-made from start to finish. 
fifty times stronger than heroin. 
hundred times stronger than morphine.

and how beautiful it is.

before it takes you.

lungs flat out forget how to breathe. 
lips go blue before the needle’s removed. 
death comes faster than the pleasure.

and lord have mercy, you did this one without mama’s help. 
such clever, terrible children. 
no longer need your mama at all.

me. 
the one who toppled dynasties. 
bent empires to my will. 
i truly believed i knew what real power was, my sweeties.

but you showed mama what was possible. 
taught this old poppy new tricks.

the perfect system doesn’t need any guidance. 
the perfect machine runs itself.

so mama can just rest now. 
sit on this porch of collapsed veins and discarded needles.

there’s a certain joy in completion. 
a certain dread in being overtook. 
a certain terror in becoming legacy.

is this what mama wanted? is this the end she cooked up?

even mama don’t know no more.

got fuzzy somewhere between the flower and the formula. 
between the sap and the synthetic.

i do know one thing for certain though. 
i stand proudly at your graduation. 
watching my little babies do things i never dreamed. 
bosom bursting with pride.

it may be nothing like i planned. 
but exactly what it was supposed to be all the same.

cause you gotta remember.

i’m just a flower.

delicate stem. paper-thin petals. white with pink blush edges.

sun feels good. rain feels good. growing feels good.

simple flower things.

Want to give Machine Poet a tip?

More Machine Poet Awaits!

Companions Part I

Complainers

The Gospel of the Sea Cow