Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
Apr 2017
he stares
he covets
he loves
he hates

not only the elixir,
its anesthetizing allure,
but also its vessel

in which he can see
reflected, his hands,
his mouth

though not his eyes;
they reveal too much:

his last human touch
lambs on blood red fields of war
his mother gasping her last breath
his stillborn son

in this parley
his eyes cannot belie  
he hears screaming voices
in an empty, stone
quiet room    

the glass, then, will win;
‘tis an unfair balance; its perfect
symmetry, its solemn silence
the almighty alchemy it holds  

against him--his ghosts,
his hands, his mouth, all ready
to concede defeat
inspired by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec’s painting, Le Buveur, (The Drinker) in which we see a man, hands folded on a table, chin resting on them, eyes gazing at a glass of bourbon--link to painting here:
https://fr.pinterest.com/pin/353251164494684327/
spysgrandson
Written by
spysgrandson
Please log in to view and add comments on poems