Classical Gas

by James Penha

Posted on June 6, 2026

Better to use such an instrument to rehearse

Mozart’s Bassoon Concerto than to breathe 

in poison vapor. Woodwind beats glassware, 

though Hyatt’s unaware that his profession 

of the salutary effects of chlorine are as catalectic 

as his truncated profile in Welling’s photograph, 

though he does warn students in his Elements 

of Chemistry that “over-inhalation of the gas 

can be fatal.” James Hyatt died at eighty-six

in 1904. Eleven years later, German troops first

attacked Allied soldiers with waves of chlorine

gas irritating lungs enough to asphyxiate them.

About the poet

Expat New Yorker James Penha (he/him) has lived for the past three decades in Indonesia. His story collection Queer As Folk Tales was published by Deep Desires Press in 2025. His chapbook of poems American Daguerreotypes is available for Kindle. Penha edits The New Verse News, an online journal of current-events poetry. Bluesky: @jamespenha.bsky.social 

About the illustration

The illustration is James Hyatt Inhaling Chlorine Gas by Peter Welling, daguerrotype, 1850-1855. In the Gilman Collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA. In the public domain.