benches

a doctor once told me
he’d never seen a heart
behave so bizarrely
so strong, stoic, mostly efficient
in good health and order
but every so often
muffled and flittering
i’ll walk for miles
through dead august heat
like the greater roadrunner
or the fennec fox
but every so often
i’ll start to see starbursts
my muscles will spasm
my gait will get wobbled
and my sternum get full
so in haste without option
i look for a bench
perhaps a small stair
a curb, or a ledge
to sit and collapse
and feel my pace quicken
my chest filled and lifting
bringing brilliant illusions
or fitting delusions 
’til a rash of sweat breaks
into untoward shivers
and the lucency to see,
to stand and meander
in rosy reprieve