TURBINE | KAPOHAU

REUBEN LOVE

Brown Study on a Leatherette Hassock

In my brown study,
my focus is on lost shoulders,
or on losing the sound, because it’s more about active noise control,
and nothing to write home about.

There are long since happened particulars
that I like drowning out in here,
such as a breathy apple crunch that you need a round chew for.
A wheyfaced New World boy, who had all the
mini-frowned kisses, had such a prerequisite chew,
whispering flexed jaw over and over in circles,
in what felt like a whispering gallery.
He passed me the apple. It looked like
he’d been passing the apple for years.
I felt a 10% collapsed lung at his presence.
I could be a tragic, an overshot clematis to everyone I knew,
yet know an edible strain of nightshade, and tell no one,
only grow it.

A thousand hours after the apple incident,
I knew how to knit and get away with it,
and he unpicked his rows. It looked like
he’d been throwing the ball for years.
He told me about the noise his bath made,
and the different parts dilating that hurt him.
We made love a lion’s call away from lions’ mini-romps,
in peak summer and with even more breathers.
He told me what a pleasure boat was.

When we were demystified, we gave each other
words that were frozen eggs to what they meant.
We kept gathering wool until it got to the teeth
and biting down became just awful.

But I like to think, when I see him walking
like he’s up some serious creek with his two amateur paddles,
that he’ll probably stay a stardust flesh composition promoter
to the end.

I’ve been whispering but no answer.