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Wise men can tell you
of stories in the stars,
how life began on this earth
and that love is an imbalance of the heart.

These wise men drank wisdom
from the pages of age-old books.
They spent their lives learning of
what others know not.

I
see you in stars.
My life began to get me to you
and I don't care what love is
as long as it makes sense to you.

I spent my life knowing that of you
what others will never know.

I read your scars
like a lover's braille.

And I am not wise at all.
O great muse, where art thou?
I watched as you
cast yourself away
one step at a time;
with my gaze fixed
at your dauntless irises
how could I have known
that with every breath
you were drifting further away.

The clocks ticked away,
and all I have is the last of
second chances.

I watched as you slowly,
very slowly,
with such grace,
effortlessly,
faded into the horizon.

And all I have to thank
is the image of you
my eye lids were able to retain.
When I die, dear Mother
don't give my body away
to science.

I'd rather have it given away to poetry.

I want people to cut me open
and observe
how my bones were riddled with
melancholic verses of joyful pasts.

They have to see
the scarlet of my blood was the hue
I stole from the sunsets of
wishful thoughts.

Dear Mother,
give my body away
to the art of writing:
for they have to look past
everything they have ever learned.

They must know
of how much I loved and I lost,
and how that made the twine of my ribs
a story to tell.
Haven't written anything new in months.
 May 2014 Budour Al Issaei
RILEY
She asks me “what do you think of me?”
I stop;
Reflect upon what just happened,
When a complexity of a girl
Asks a simple guy
What he thinks about her.

She asks me “what do you like about me?”
I’ll tell you what I hate;
I don’t hate your eyes,
Like round circles we used to make
With our dancing bodies
In preschool playgrounds.
I don’t,
Hate your lips;
They could be traced
From a million miles
And they curve so beautifully.
I don’t hate your smile,
The semi grins you keep
Before the flashes,
Before the posts;
I don’t hate your eyes,
Like bullets entering the soul
With an insertion of dopamine.

She asks me “do you really think I am worth your troubles?”
You are not.
You deserve my delight;
You deserve my green days and blooming flowers,
You deserve my watering mouth
Nourishing the vines underneath your tongue,
You deserve the sunrises in my playlists
And sunsets in the warmth of my jackets;
You are not worthy of my troubles
I am not worthy of my troubles.

She pushes me away,
The walls are too tight
And the stares,
They scrape on our throats.
The girl is lonely,
Her social circle spreads wide enough
To leave a gap;
Her friends walk next to her
And not on her side;
Her smiles-
Electronic cigarettes that look genuine,
But the smoke never rests
On the teeth,
Just a vapor that fades away.
She’s anchored to her reality
Her ships are not meant to sail
Just yet.

She asks me “what do you think of me?”
You’re a concept;
You’re a fusion of vivid elements
Wired with secret buttons
Hidden in your desires.
You’re an emotional rollercoaster
That we ride
You and I,
When I think of you
You’re just a white canvas
That whispers into my soul
The true meaning of art.

She asks me “is this your real answer?”
She ask me “is this your real answer?”
I was born in the arms of imaginary friends, who helped me sing a tangled melody;
Never to be accepted, veiled in secret reverie
I was taught  to dance at the hands of winds –  yet to look past graffiti filled walls
I was Molded, and structured, like Jell-O art.
Losing a battle filled with right and wrong stepping into pools of silence and books of empathy
I taught the shadow how to hide
And the night how shine;
And you never bothered me.
To abide, tolerating  frigid rules. A mainstream battle against futile ignorance, that’s how I pictured this .
Filled with hope, and love at ideas of excellence that got you no were, but pity. Yet  you refuse to let go and refuse my absence with sterner conviction of long turned believes.
No longer in use, no longer mine;
And I have to abide- no longer.
I was born with diligence and rebellion is a skill. One of intelligence, at least till I grow old enough to know otherwise.
As for now, my hands are open- waiting to mold myself apart from you
Feet pointed towards the door, mouth ajar- and you don’t want to hear these words.
And you don’t have a choice , because there must be some explanations to stacks of luggage waiting to walk out of your doors, and I was never one to lie- just to hide, like I am now
I was never yours.
I was always mine.
I see the lot, denominated in slots, automated in spots, weakest to the plot, and I'm not, convinced it is wrong, nor minced in my longing for a song, a song to the sum, to the sun, to the one unto the ones unto none, nada, nothing, but a hum from beyond, a rumbling from a haunt, stumbling from a heart, belonging to a spark that departed a long-long time ago, where it started, and I'll go-go back there for the harp, for the halo, for the art of it, standing on the stars, apart, but a part of it, I'll go for the horns, for the dark, and for the parts discarded, I will, try my hardest, to remain in progress, a battery that charges for the harvest of the starkest of the larvae unto the fiercest flies, unto spider webs in fragile skies, finite lines up high, where I'll die knowing I flew, die knowing the truth, the use, the abuse, the ruse, the heights of my sight, igniting in the lie, in the cries, so distant now, but a distinctive growl from yesteryear's child so mild, so wild as to be outed by a new sound, so profound as to drown the complexity out, and simply shout from anyone's mouth, reading out-loud and clear, my cloud, my thoughts, my fear, left right here on a single space, where I placed it and saved it away in the seventh day of this resting case, that is all but closed, a screen saver transposed as knowns exposed, and I'm aroused in knowing the doubts are clothed in lace, soaked on display for my placation's of our days, the daze, hazily grazing on the safe, the fates, locked in a slate, for later placement to a shape, I'm hate, wrapped in a hopeful taste, waiting for a saying to say it all,  ~ I'm spaced.
i'm sure you could imagine,
the new proud parents' joy.
when the doctor finally announced,
"you have a baby boy"

as she held him in her arms,
all their worries were erased.
they didn't know then,
of the troubles they would face.

"i'm sorry i have to be the one to say,
your little boy has cancer.
i know that life seems hard today,
things are always worse before the get better."

endless hours of chemotherapy,
hospitals becoming a second home.
dozens of tests to check his status,
he was watched but felt so alone.

some days he felt big and strong,
and other days trapped in hell.
it was in the little boy's smile,
the way that you could tell.

and though the boy was small in size,
he fought with all his might.
the cancer's strength he matched for awhile,
he put up a pretty good fight.

time of death, 4:12

his mother smoothed down his hair,
and kissed him on his cheek.
the tears rolled down her face,
she'd never felt so weak.

his father felt his son's heart beat,
then fall silent just as fast.
he had been there for his son's first,
and he had felt his son's last.

— The End —