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For Melody Nova

For this comet's path I chose it, carved it
to be our temporary castle. In the act of opening
I let its secrets leak out into the starlight,
exposing this pocked and hissing water-ice
as blue as your seven elder sisters.
I shaped it to us till it shone. It is not terraformed
(this is no earth) but transfigured: a chiselled, burnished fluid.

You descend, shimmering darkly.
The scent of you, of alien metals, diffuses
into my atmosphere of breath and frozen dust.
And of desire: you, nebula-born, you empyrean beauty,
I would see you nova-bright and radiant,
pulsing, brilliant with every cosmic hue.
Yet I have tumbled through so many skies,
and found none to be your match. I have no stars to give.

I hold out my empty hands. As solar wind strokes the ice-wall
into light, into life, my reaching fingers glitter with their gift:
We are the void. (I touch your cheek.)
We hold the stars already,
and we burn, we burn.



Toby MacNutt is a nonbinary, queer, and disabled poet, dancer, and textile artist living in northwestern Vermont. They have previously been published in Arsenika, Liminality, and other magazines, and their collection If Not Skin was published in 2018 by Aqueduct Press. They also occasionally self-publish zines. Find out more at www.tobymacnutt.com.
Current Issue
18 Sep 2023

Ama’s arm rested protectively around the girl’s shoulder as the giant bird glided above, its head angling right to left. Violet-black wings soared across a cloudless sky, blocking the sun’s midday rays and swathing sections of the village in deep shadow. Given its size, this argentavis was one of her first, but too far above for her to differentiate by name. Even across the distance, Ama could feel its heartbeat synced to hers, their lives intertwined until death.
She is leaving the world that is pink with desire, on her gray cardboard rocket ship.
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