I fight in a battle against myself,
a war between life and death.
The longer it roars on,
the less chance, I think,
I have to win.
And I have to win,
because losing means
that I lose everything,
and everyone that matters to me loses, too.
In this fight to the death,
I’m killing myself slowly,
my addiction eating away at
my health,
my judgments,
my relationships.
I am either looked at
like a sad puppy,
pitied and worried about,
or a diseased dog,
judged, backed away from.
I am losing myself
as I lose this war,
and it looks, indeed, like I am losing.
This is a fight
between my addiction and me,
and it is the stronger foe;
it is my mortal enemy.
And when it’s done,
when it has won,
I’ll have lost my mortality.

I am dying,
and I can’t stop it,
even though I am the only one
who can actually try.
I feel hopeless
as I fight against myself,
the addict-me versus the old-me,
as the old-me tries to win back
what it lost so long ago.
I don’t even remember
what sober feels like anymore.
Every time I try to quit,
I fail,
I sit
writhing in agony
as my need proceeds
to pull me back in;
the taste I can’t
get out of my head
overwhelms me
until no longer can I see
straight,
and more than anything,
I truly hate
that antagonizing taste
inside my head,
because soon enough,
it will leave me for dead.
But until then
I can only try to survive,
as I fight myself
and the addiction inside.