Pondering Life

The Pen

Am I speaking calculus?
my many sided personality
like a mathematical theorem
based on chalk,
or so you think.

When my thoughts unwind
I lose the translation
traveling distances beyond infinite,
only to return confounded by the journey.

Do others who pen the world feel similar
I wonder.

I get caught up in the mystery
time turns transparent
and when it seems beyond description
day settles into night
the pen becomes silt,
layered and deeply thought through,
and settling like sediment.

Kevin Harling


Eternal

Whatever you do, leave the sky where it is
let the air fall to the sea tourmaline
and when the quiet ascends hush white
whispers and when the dawn descends its
glacial curtain don't bother to change.

Whatever you do between the day and night
rise like a butterfly angel cloud and sit
upon the mantle of destiny and do not budge,
survey and gather options of the sea and when
the salt tastes liquid hold on to your breath
and whatever you do be nothing but yourself.

Kevin Harling


Shale

Slate gray
murmuring
pines,
gypsies
and the
jasmine
silhouette
of a
pumpkin
with chocolate
shoulders,
and
the buzz of
erasers
hovering
like skeletons
in somebody elses
closet,

it felt like chalk
had invaded the air.

You said
you couldn't
find, hear
the symmetry
of pages
rewritten and,
because the ink
was diluted
you deduced and
thrust in
like a trowel
and,
suggested
strawberries
would be better.

Shortcake
crumbles like
the legs of
a poorly constructed
table of Oak,
minus a few
sturdy chairs,
and I was reminded
how infrequently
we meet in the
middle,
crumbs and
residues
patched together
into a make-shift
relationship,
like two ships
missing in the night
adrift and
stranded by the
absence of any wind.

In a stall of weather
when the lake stops
chirping
the loon calls skyward
the melancholy moon
suspended by the lyrical
thrush.

What remains
is more than embers
of ash white coal,
the smell of charcoal
pungent to the touch,
everything lingers
but outside the collusion,
Shale sits waiting,
waiting for an adequate
response,
patient like
calcium.

Kevin Harling


The Message

I saw the sky fall out the window
it fell 26 floors to the sea,
not even the salt could stop its fall.
The sun shone topaz and slithered
like an eel trying to escape.
I wondered about God and how he grieves?
Whether in his haste he missed all the
warning signs.
But when the stars went black, as black as
sleep, you could not help but doubt creation.
The day turned green and hazy like
chlorophyll
and my bones felt like rust.
The messenger wore a flowing red robe
and the clouds speculated about the descent
into the middle of everywhere.
This was a be all and end all like a switch
that finishes the light.
The message was simple, Armageddon was
coming today.

Kevin Harling


The Weaver

Magenta threads of silk
woven like a parachute
falling from the sky like
sheep asking about sleep
and the mysterious parish
that rested on the hill
across from the cemetery
cafe in a red illusion.

The sky periwinkle shone
radiant and everywhere the
clouds doubted blue and
when the day cast its hand
umber only the causes remained
like mist and the water felt
like tears heavy and drooping
to the ground like dirt in
wet clumps that spoke in a deep
monotone voice that bellowed.

The shades of purple that sank
to mauve at the turn of a page
and the letters showed their red
blushing surfaces with cheek, and
so condensation seems to say
all the wrong things in the end.

These minutes translated in
muted ink compromised by the
intention to be ambiguous and
somehow it all falls down like
a lightning bolt of brass hammers,
and then straight out of nowhere
four horseman rode in covered in
black petals and carrying gold sickles
that sparkled like diamonds against
the night sky blackbird.

Kevin Harling