KOLBY HARVEY

STARLIGHT HONEYMOON THERAPY KISS

a bed is old LIPSTICK not
learning new TRICKS
because I’d be remiss not to
bring up YELLOW dildos

that selfsame bed—my skirt a curtain, pleat
A TARTAN A TARTAN A TARTAN a sock

now dark out
over the lake, a SWAN balcony

there are MOONS between us
                       and underneath
                       silicate noodles

our grocery cannot save us
yet that NEON jaguar
that seal puppy birthday clam bake
we threw—THE RICHNESS OF THE SEA
MORE THAN THE SKY ABOVE

oh happy a thousand times happy though not
exactly YELLOW
must we in the window
to get gone or something far?
please, of course

I'd love LOVE
fresh blooming in my lung
my gorgeous HEART 4U
a burning radiance

[UNDER THE HOT PINK BUBBLE SHOWER]
           all that is left once a stellar eagle
           an opulent soul at the crest of god
           what princess
           what cakes & scales

then knowledge of
the space between MOONS
of the crystal SWAN tide we gave
so we floated to an old haunt CHEZ MOI
through that ear piercing gun of a mall
and we floated through TIMESTREAM
and BRIGHTNESS and WEEKEND and
closed an eye-wish
to remember
when that freshest of loves
bent me to pillow to
speak FURBISH to my hair

BEAUTIFUL.

MOON SPIRAL HEART ATTACK

In the formation of the moon-brain, the baby’s body soars as comet cloud through the Heavens. When an object mars-brain is thought to have collided. Then earth to be rent asunder, and from the leavings, the two hemispheres of the moon-brain. If it pleases, imagine the swirling of gray matter and the tidal shifting of hot hot skull.

But this is only beginning. 

Soon a whirlpoolery of tricks conveys the subtlest of nerved explosions,

initiated is the boolean brain bleed.
 

And a tightness in the heart,
the most tacky of cards.

If it wanted this moon could rip the hearts from our souls, right out of our loves. That would be the final kisses. But that is not today’s telegraph, no,
we have utmost obligation to twist so as to be unbreaking of the fall
                                       into the ocean’s immensity. It is unavoidable
                                                                         and the tides forbid as such.

                              Which is heavier: moon rock or the mass of the sea?

Neither is the hand and neither is the love-heartbeat beating on, but if only the brain could be whetted. From the blood paddy a best view of the collision may be established. From wet knees, the touch of satellite skull—browbeaten cratered, pock-ridden. Swelling love is the end of every thought, the cut sleeve of a comatose peach. This implies sleep and yes. So as not to disturb. And also intimate growth, which attracts the invasions. Rifts plumbed for all treasures. Such healing we seek in the tide, and such heart taken.

DOUBLE STARLIGHT HONEYMOON THERAPY KISS

What is more beautiful than to live on an inland sea? There are now moons between us, but once we stood over a great lake packed so tightly with swans we could not see the water. As many swans as stars outside my space station. When I left you said the red of mars would be that of a pulsing heart but instead it is red-brown, no pulse, only dust clouds and peroxide snow. At the edge of the sea, we ate cold noodles on the balcony. Our grocery could not save us, yet—

Do you remember the Christmas we exchanged neon ocelot and seal puppy? The next day your seal escaped into the sea, slipped through the tartan grid of swans into the black water while the ocelot napped on the credenza. The cat grows restless over mars, its neon dulled by a life in metal. Its favorite treat is ovaries of the crab, and I give them daily. For this moment after, the fur shines anew.

The seal puppy possessed such knowledge, the richness of the sea more than the sky above. To a seal, a cake of cloud holds no savour; to you, baby, the deep sea, the dark boom, was sweetest. There is a freshness in leaving that was not avoided when the wind ripped through the empty house on the sea. The last touch—it is as though you tattooed the feeling of kiss to my face. Old lipstick not learning new tricks.

Remember that day the wind picked up on the sea, the swans rolling on the water, then taking flight—a white tidal wave washing up and over the balcony. Their feathers blew onto the glass balcony door and were a sheet of paper.

Then we met in a dream and floated to an old haunt. We drifted as stellar eagles, opulent souls at the crest of godhood. Oh happy, a thousand times happy. And we floated through timestream and brightness and weekend and we shored up chez moi under an apple tree where I put my face to a pillow of blossoms and you bent to speak furbish to my hair.

When I woke, the white of blossoms still flashed across my vision while outside stars snow-danced over a black sea. Crowded together so, what gorgeous radiance, these stars—the crystal swans.

Kolby Harvey is an MFA candidate at the University of Colorado at Boulder where he teaches Creative Writing. His work has appeared in Birkensnake, The Yoke, and American Book Review. His chapbook, The Mothercake Cycle, was a finalist in the Black River Chapbook Competition.