Ectopic heart
beat. Acoustic
neuroma. Sleep
apnea. Getting
older blessing
against alternative.

Neither hate
nor repair.
Immediately
the woods were familiar -
bunchberry, clintonia.
Red spruce, yellow birch.

Heron rowing
northward overhead
a sign: good luck.
Or was it just
a crow. Rock thrown.
Don't know.

Life's ending.
My sons
have each other
for laughter
at their tragedies.
Avalanche, cataract.

Clean house or
run for president.
Power and talent
are bones in your feet.
Nature's the bed
you'll sleep in.

Thyroid storm.
Screech
of the long-eared
owl. Even if
portent of death,
it's welcome.

I like things
That do not belong
Mislaid, lost
Dropped, thrown
How do they end up in my frame
How come I keep on noticing.

I am attracted to things
That do not quite seem to fit
Subtly ruining it;
A smudge, a note
A love
Unwritten in the stars.

A weakness
For displaced happiness
Somewhere I never intended;
Maybe,
My love,
I misplace my heart in the right spot.

I'm sitting here listening to a song
Wondering how I was so wrong
I used to think the days were long
But with days comes longer nights
It's hard to determine wrong or right
The way my face lit up from fright
As I knew I'd have to spend it alone
Thinking I'll be fine, I have grown
But a house is never ever a home
When I have to spend it isolated
And I hear echoes of words
Words that may remain unstated
As I get into a slight altercation
With my own mind, debated
Whether I should feel happy
Whether I should feel crabby
Whether this world was a big cage
Or that Earth was rather a grand stage
These purple walls feel black and white
And although the stars lit up the night
I'm left with the thought of how
Every star will eventually burn
Stabbing thoughts at every turn
As I start to think about all the encounters
All the people I have met
All the people I have yet to meet
And whether we were parallel lines
That were never meant to meet
Or we were somewhere in an
Almost asymptotic situation.

I had hoped my lives was not TanX
As I think on how my mind's been vex
Distorted , contorted to a fault.

I'm randomly thinking, over thinking
Just wondering whether I should be fine
Or draw upon another line
That separated the nights and the days
Where I was no longer dazed
By the fact that I have no real words to speak
And if I did, I would not know where to seek
As I keep my mindset on a ranting style
Letting it run wild
With thoughts of whether I should show concern
Over people of my past
As though the relapse of a friendship is evident
But it's not like lives became relevant
We kept thoughts to ourselves
Racking brains to sizes of elephants.
I ask myself,
Over and over again
No, I beg myself
Please pick up the pen
Just write your thoughts
Show the world your inner den
And then
I'm caught between writing useless words
That go unread or unheard
Fleeting like the migration of a bird
Just in and out of no real value
But I touched on many personal topics
And in a rather ectopic
Way this has become my personal diary.

I want to tell a story
It is about a star in the night sky
Well you see, this star
She was a bright one
She kept her light on
Just to guide the world home
And in her own life
She made those who felt alone
Felt appreciated, felt loved
She stole many hearts
Broke many hearts
And indeed broken as is
She knew how to fixed hearts
Sewed them up with threads
From the very veins that ran
Through her own heart.
Well you see one big problem
This bright lustrous star
Met a floating comet
This comet, you see
He wasn't a nice one
He wanted lights, gone
And kept his heart imprisoned
Inside a ribcage that
Resembled the cages
Within a hidden cave.
She, the bright light of a star
Was drawn to him,
Couldn't get near him,
Yet couldn't get far from him,
And so she knew of a solution
She let her lights dim,
Just so she could see him,
Just so she could hold him,
And with her fading lights
She left one night
Set up on a different life
When she knew nothing
Nothing could ever be right.
He, the comet felt stupid
Because although they floated
High above in space,
There was this asteroid
Named cupid
who tied their hearts together
...
And so he cried on and on
He cried till the tears were gone.

Light years pass by
He, the stupid comet
Met another star
That shined brighter than he
Have ever seen in a long time
Except he could only admire
He could only admire her from
A distance
In attempt at persistence
He realised her shine was warm
Her shine was comforting
Her shined stopped the hurting
Her shine lit through the curtains
Although she was different
Different to the old star
Yet the comet tried and tried
Wondering whether the part
Of him, that usually crashes
The Earth have died
Or whether he was just tired.
This comet had many uncertainties
But one thing was certain
He had not deserved her warmth
So he believed the Big Bang
Had made the comet and the star
Light years apart for a reason
And although the comet
Admired the beauty of the star
The kindness shown by the star
The care shown by the star
The warmth of the star
He knew maybe his life
As a comet was to only
Get along with a comet
And so with a conflicted mind
The comet found himself
A solution, the one thing
He had ever done right,
That was to bring the night
So that the star would
Always be around.
In the end of the story
Whatever the comet chose
Whatever the comet did
He knew within his mind
That no matter what
He would have made
A new marvellous friend.

The comet's light
  ... died...
within this last
  . ..line...

i was living life on my knees when
I met JB, he was a song with a body part
in the title, a guardian, a saint, maybe a one-time
guitarist for Kiss.

(The last man to see Jesus, as far
as I am aware of, was the apostle John.
sometimes in his sleep he still whispered
“please don’t bury me, please
don’t bury me, please”.)

but JB had bowed to Baal, had kissed him,
bought a 20 dollar nosebleed from
a man with seven stars in his right hand,
a sharp thing in his mouth.
JB was not an apostle,
but he knew the knees of my heart,
gave his knees to the needy,
shoved soldiers, stared.

we spat in our gloves.
he said I have a swordfish mind,
but I have left 7,000 in Israel,
loved the oh of his mouth as the
stone rolled away, I have
met Jesus, face-to-face.
please don’t bury me.

these were the Great Days,
the First Aid: a myth that cost lives
taped us tight, and when he told me
that 150,000 people die in Britain every day
I said “instead, tilt your head forward,
pinch your nostrils shut and breathe with
your mouth; a half-sitting position with
your knees bent and head and shoulders.”

he did as I said and, later, John
put his **** in my mouth.

Reactive arthritis
affects the large joints, the knees,
causes pain, swelling,
an ectopic tongue on the floor
of the mouth.

Where are you now
Seemed like you were on my back
Holding me back
With that warm embrace

Your warm memories sigh
Seem so benign
Don't step out of line
As well you know your place

The solace you sought
Was to give a millstone
Beguiled and betray your tone
I'd have you back again

Held me so close a cloistered prince
Thrive on your hypoxic high
On your placental supply
Ectopic asphyxiation

Be we whom are enchanted,
to thee and me

‘Oh can you hear the poets of ole’?
Like a sea of cosmic sirens whispering,    
beckoning to ruinous liquid tear shores?
And yet a fire burns in dulcet serenade,
a phoenix sweeps by in offering
lonely nights starlight winter quill

─ Driven brittle illusions thus we write,
a poets song that cannot be sung,  
A poetic graveyard summoned,
where diamond dreams never die

─ To thee and me

A private world born of poetry,
─ be amber and obsidian secrets told,
Seek you in a box of Pandora,
Thy gift, a slip of mirror you in sparkling glass,
a puzzle to be a line in write,
and thyself beautiful it shall be,
and so, it is written,
‘Where pretty words bloom and bleed,
And the last precious flower is kissed goodbye

─ in a poets dream  

And so it be pendulous contemplation for a  
Raven hunts within unrequited,
spilling love, blood and seed,
ectopic words bud and grow in raining malignant-need,  
born in flurry of prose to be read golden,
read free

Our incense blood be thrilled in a silent perfumed tomb
Adorned ******, yet breathlessly unholy,
etched on distant wings weaving,
Capturing grandfather’s time,
In a garden of amaranthine words

─  For thee and me

© Arnay Rumens (ASPAR) 07 2016