For the Heights (Edit 2)

[Weeded]

Edit 2

Misty gloves meet molten sulfur
painting Ijen electric blue,
glorifying the solfatara-
breather's, the livings and the eaters,
darkness displaying the beauty of the night
miner gold's contrails.

They breathe mustard fumes,
drink acid metal,
they carry the weight of eternity on their back
up and down Ijen's summit
until they die.

Wait, this is about mining? I thought this was about art and shit -- I saw those misty gloves as the smoke painting the Ijen (which at first I did not know was a volcano, but that I think was more my 'fault' than yours), then the solfatara (skipping breathers because of the damn enjambment) as a sort of unifying "I, singular smoke, paint all volcanoes so", then that whole "they" bit as a really trippy way of centering the energies of the poem (I mean, hey, it begins with mustard gas, continues with drinking, of all things, '"acid metal"', then ends with a Jacob's ladder to death!). Well then ---------

In a more serious tone, even with that ambiguity the introduction of "miners" presents, this is still pretty good -- in the end, with that "they" absolutely senseless, but, like, say, a good middle-Beatles song, good. But ah, that ambiguity -- eventually, senseless good becomes forgettable drivel, unless you put a melody (or a bird) on it. And since this is a pretty obscure subject, my recommendations would be to make everything obvious outright: insert, say, the whole miner line, mustard fume line, and Ijen's summit line right on the top of the poem. Or maybe just donate this to the right audience, maybe an article protesting (or whatever) such operations -- I can only see such changes leading to worse quality, and again, this is already pretty good, with "pretty" meaning "it's its own".

Ah, but here's a nitpick: if my science is correct, it's not molten sulfur that's blue, but evaporated/plasma-something-ed sulfur, with molten sulfur being deep red. And sure, the alliteration is great, but still....
Oh, and another one: why would a miner carry his product back to the mine, especially if his product is useless to the whole operation?

RN,
This is an attempt at an allegory, I wanted to allude the practices of sulfur miners to topics more relevant to say, a 1st world audience.

But it seems the ambiguity is still the driving force of this piece, I've learned its unwise to explain what I perceive my poem to mean as everyone takes different meanings to the same thing, so im not sure whether I should explain myself or edit to make it obvious. I think im going to go with the latter based on your suggestions, and see where this goes from there.

And hm, I need to find the article I was reading and share it, it showed a picture of a black sky highlighted with electric blue streaks and said it was molten sulfur interacting with the condensation in the air.

Oh and I guess the miners have to trek up Mt. Ijen, down into the volcanoes pit, extract the sulfur by hitting the shit out of the rock with hammers, load it up on these bags tied to long wooden poles they rest on their shoulders, and proceed to hike up out the pit and back down the volano. Hence the 'up and down'

Thanks for the feedback, im working on revising, will post soon,
mike