Thoughts

Black Syllables

One more word, let me say one more thing
before I crash on the shore of my existence
let me spell how I feel, let your mouth say the words
softly and gently spilled with emotions I have to let go
i need for you to know, the touch of my hands
the pulse of my fingers, the sound of my heart
as it beats with yours, from a distance
just one more thought, filled with black syllables
trembling and shuddering with a different kind of pain
someway I can hold you, even if not in my arms
just one more word, that falls from my eyes
in black syllables filled with a different kind of pain,
a pain I enjoy, pain contained in words that linger.

Kevin Harling


Following You Into the Mystery

Let me comb the seashell pearl beach
of my existence brush it in sand and
in the briefest of intermissions
starfish aquamarine and floating air
water eyes that see beyond waves day
and in the night time mystery pillow
let the dreams unravel like a shroud
light white veil and in the silver
reflected by its own sound stepping
space vase lily lotus wading sky and
then in the balance the innocence I
sing.

Kevin Harling


Enigma

I acquaint the stars with the moon
the sea with skin porcelain and white.

I hear eternity in your whispers
they shatter my thoughts fingers.

I abandon epiphany sheer and becoming
tracing my world in your breath.

I touch music in your sky transparent
hollowed and blemished by red lips.

I acquaint the space between us in union
for that we are one can never be denied.

Kevin Harling


Over This , Over You

I surrender my
red seas to your blue
cheek sky,
I give my winds
of autumn to the stars
of yesterdays losses
and I
bargain the margins
of seconds I cannot forgive,
and I
save my best for first
instead of last
passing over and not under,
and I
trust white truth
skipping past the grey
and I
hand you my wishes
like a parcel
and I
pass you the tears of
my kisses to hold
onto.

Kevin Harling


Ghosts

If I told you
what was missing
this matrix of letters
could never dispel
nor acquaint themselves
with any real meaning,

silent ambition
declares the dusk
like a deserted beach
sending clowns
instead of angels
to do the dirty work.

What was missing
had nothing to do with pieces
nothing to do with
subtraction
of taking away from.

Silhouettes of liquid
cold lines
spill from my lungs
weighed down by this earth,
by the moons sighing look
ghosts in transition
faces of a past
fastly approaching
mantles and pawns
coming and going.

If I told you what was missing
the veil would smile
like a halo.
If I told you...

Kevin Harling


As If I Could

It feels like I have been sent to uncover,
I the discoverer of islands and things,
who steps virgin upon blue sky and oceans,
who walks without a whisper of, to decipher,
I the piper and the pen, wayward glens,
ventured red moons and sun, the
valley and creeks, things to be spoken,

I feel as if I am a messenger, sent,
from somewhere closer to Heaven, but
I must repent, relent, let it go,
I feel as if I can touch, clouds,
air and sea, like I can be free,
I feel as if I see, me and stars,
earth , soil, fire and birth.
I feel like I can stand, above,
clouds and wings, the many things,
that try to distract.

I feel like I can fly, further than the sky
these words this sky and song blue
bluer than blue can be high
much higher than you can see the sky

As if I could reach, touch, feel,
the sky.

Kevin Harling


Grace

Transfered in silence, the fleeting fall from grace,
the trace of dew on the leaves, footsteps across a meadow.
Seconds slip, a river bends around hollow precincts,
the curving lines that seem to meander, taking their time.
I am stalling in green pastures, the knotted grasses of my mind
coming undone, turning over stones, unlocking secrets.
These spilled words like pearls in a necklace, the polished
sentences that fall between the lines.
I am unassuming my presence, patiently looming in valleys
and over the hills.
I am looking at blue skies, floating above Why
I am talking with angels, soaring in the clouds,
nowhere is too high.
I am patiently waiting for one more look in your eyes
I am unassuming.
Way above the reason Why.

Kevin Harling


A Whisper

I am lost in the dust
forgotten like the whisper
you just let go of,

mirrors mock the sea
with a quiet confidence
the hours wincing white light
and how a

rainbow disturbs the sky
with fradulent lashes
long ago was the dawn
tears are never far
from the cheek
when they fall.

It crawls like the opium
furniture that adorns
the shoals of that place.

The dust beckons the night
subdued by the crowns and
brambles of chins
admonishing the dusk.

I am forgotten by the ghosts
shipwrecked by vigils
and moors that call
out to me
here I am
here.

Kevin Harling


Water Under The Bridge

Amphibious pelicans
correspond with jellyfish
via email over tea
talking about revelations
as if it was news
everything undulated
crystal blue
bottled water waves
and the sun shone
like it was waving
and
the sky was made of plastic
paper wrap like parchment
and you recycled the newspapers
every tuesday night as the dawn rose
blush , you couldn't hide your discontent
of the rent with brine nor salt
that filled the harbours light,
take a breath and breathe
your disbelief tasted like a spring onion.

The minutes were augmented by
seaweed
and I suppose it was more about
the fault and the absence of any
green leaflets that fall on the floor
pavement, pride or envy,
the shades of things,
contours
that make up the geography
lines and maps you cross off
with X's and,
somehow the circle
became angular and full of
radii like sparks,
and

Isoceles comes to mind
like paint
drops that blotch
only certain things,thighs
like a triangular circumstance
drawn by someone elses hands.

Touch the sky austere and tap
into the water,
the water by the bay left
of some country beach chalet
tucked neatly under the table
and dreaming of the
black forest by the grove.

Arcs and lines debate
with the stars about Christmas
in july on some island peninsula
of teal blue green between seas
unfolding just like a blanket
made up of marshmallows and
the crickets talked
about cadence
as if it was silent
with cicadas
and balloons,
and "Walden Pond" sprang to mind
like a chorus of bullfrogs
croaking out of tune
and the baboons
congreagted in the courtyard
of the plaza hotel on the strip
somewhere around midnight,
sipping margaritas and recalling
two paper blunts.

But lets get back to the pelicans
railing on about the flight
and while fleeing at the lips
pattern runway around the corner
lighthouse retreat
something had leaked out,
and streets nameless
architects faceless
crowds,
and in-between
in the middle of the road
laneway alley hamlet
the colour of cobblestone
and upon the landing
somewhere over here.

I listened to starfish
deciphering the TSX
on the 6 O'Clock news,
and
everything was surface
covered by normal
informal and pre-empted
by adverts blue
and full of subliminal intentions.

What did the email say
about revelations and,
What about all the plastic
you bubblewrap the truth with?

Here among the jellyfish
pelicans put on the suits,
the algae ascends like sunday
and amphibious is a day
of the week.

Kevin Harling

Poetry in the Key of Life

Halo

Walls that fall
from the windows
face like
stone glass
making a gathering sound
somewhere around
the knees.
I fall down
chipped away
by the sky
that erodes my chin.
Hollowed air
breathes
like a lifeless
remorse, atonal
and searching for that
one answer.
The light shines
below the sea,
urchin and escaping
the sand
slipping through my
fingers of bone
like rust.
I cannot forego
the waves flow
nor can I correlate
the distance
but I am getting
closer.

Kevin Harling


Love

The questions
never preclude the dawn
wings like hope
and eyelids that
are all a flutter
cannot ease my chin.

All that is desire
and the way lust
permeates my flesh,

with hands and smiles
all a glow, to touch
bliss and heavenly limbs,
that satisfy divinity
with napes and necks
that deny being defined.

O how can this be
embraces, traces and rust
cannot molt or decipher
such lofty ideals.

I adore and look for
you with eyes that
refuse to not see
the union and unity,

To behold and be held
of such delights
even the stars and moon
bequeath their breath.

To love I toast
the wine of its tender song.

Kevin Harling


Neruda Resurrected

Dress your tresses in white ash
resurrect the idylls with resplendent velocity
resurrect every leaf with crimson charity
resurrect the bees with a sobbing sword of blood
let the earth ripple like a river of lightning

touch the moon with a nocturnal melancholy
filling the void of space with voices
drown my hands with ciphers and poppies
wrap my memory in marrow, in veins of cellophane
in sighs replete with oxygen

look at me horizontally in a baptism of knees
open your heart to retreat
with pale words that escape crime
dowse me with soft caresses, with legs and ears
kiss me with needles and black mirrors

roll me in a symmetry of marmalade
in alabaster eyelashes and fingers
mold me in waves and raindrops
stimulate my rooms with blankets and ruffled black stockings
blister my heart in an ocean of sweat

with a thicket of sickles
with a smack of muffled bones
let my memories merge like a jellyfish.

Kevin Harling


I Never Knew You and Still

With deciphered bitterness I long
I never knew you and still
the doors of solitude will not close
your voluptuous geography opaque
my ardent eyes like coal
my steeled hands softened by wind.

This topography shrinks in heartbeats
the textures of resolve falling away
the voracious touch of sweat eroding
in salt like topaz kneeling in worship.

How I remember when and how
in silent abandon the night lingered
the hyacinth whispers echoed and chimed
in soft caresses of silver rain.

I never knew you and yet
the taste of loss loiters in bedrooms, and
hallways, and traces of familiar kisses,
and the scent of lavender flesh, upon
the brow of this remembrance fading
it fades in eyelashes, in flowing hair,
in long soft legs spooning.

Kevin Harling


Let Me Try to Explain

I keep the world at a distance
navigating it's underbelly of silk with
copious steps like a starfish
trying not to tread to hard on anything.

I see the sky glimmering with blue faces
looking at the way it's transparent landscape
is blemished by clouds.

I trace the land terra-cotta, like a snake
traversing its length, shedding my flesh with words,
slithering verbs that coerce its nature and meaning.

Trying to explain the salt and sand, delving into
the interior of water and grass to sense it's
fears.

I look at the surface of things, the way the hands
are worn smooth by hours that grate the exterior,
the way opinions of how to use time differ.

The dusty minutes that transfer fingerprints
upon the hours with an opaque smirk.

Nothing resolves or revolves that way it
appears it should, everything is running
around chasing itself, the wind, the rain,
the sea.

The air is askew jarred by panting breath,
the water trembles with waving handshakes,
informal and hesitant to make contact.

No wonder the day separates from night
and black obscures the white, why wrong
most times wins over right.

I try to see myself in glass pictures,
to feel myself in the music of the trees
chattering in the breeze, to hear myself
in a conch shell sunbathing on a beach
alone, to listen to it's conversation
with God.

I cannot fathom the depths, the angles,
the miles nor for that matter what drifts
in-between.

I am a nomad lost in a street, in an unfamiliar
world, on a planet in the middle of a galaxy
spinning.

So many things are undetected, so much is nonsense,
so many things I abhor and still innately a small
voice asks me to laugh, to comment, to observe.

Life is opaque, it is ambiguous, it is joyous
and jaded by shades and shadows of light.

I am an observer.

Kevin Harling