My derelict soul
rolls west, to under
the Benton Street Bridge.
The bridge is strange and
lonely and changed, with
Steve and Scott dead.
Both of them died on
the railroad tracks.
The ducks are still there,
under the Benton Street Bridge.
A feral calico cat stalks
them with death and
hunger in her eyes.
The river's up.
Fish jump where me
and Carl used to sit and
sing old Motown songs.
I'm in the nut ward for
the umpteenth time.
***** induced madness.
Pensive about life;
bereft of hope,
I wonder:
Am I just a lost duck?
Maybe I'll ask that
slender cat.

It doesn't seem like
Christmas.
Mom and Dad are gone,
the kids are grown; There's no
snow on the ground, and
I'm in the psych ward again.
There is a dead dog loneliness
about the place.
All the patients are asleep,
and it's too early to get
my medicine.
Coffee has replaced
***** in my diet, and
I feel like I'm in a
battle without a shield.
Even the pen I wield
isn't as sharp as it
used to be.

She left me like
Brutus left Caesar
like a shark attack.
My back was bent and
bleeding, and I was well
versed in delirium.

She had the electricity
shut off the day after
she abandoned me, and I drank
myself into a new oblivion.
There were kittens in
the wall--shadows tall and hot,
and I was well versed
in delirium.

I stole Four Locos' from
the convenience store, but
not enough to keep
the goblins at bay.
They chased me through
my nightmare--molested
me at dawn.
The elixir exorcised the monsters.
But I often misplaced it,
in the dryer or fireplace.
Meat began to rot in
the freezer, and I was
well versed in delirium.

My moon flowered brain thought
the cat tree was
a person.
I paced the floor and
talked to it; asked questions,
sought solace.
Degradation of the
mind reached critical mass.
And I landed in the
psych ward again.
The bats brought seizures,
and cheesecake, and yogurt
berry parfaits that were
to die for.
I was well versed in
delirium

At the bottom of the bottle
my own warped face-- the glass,
eyes that reflect 2014 for what it was

the bottle-neck becoming mine 

At the bottom of the barrel
I find words for poetry, words for me. 

At the bottom of it all I can see.

"I'm not hungry"
How many times have
I said that?
This time, it's the
recent woman in my life.
She wants to savor
the buzz.
Food would interfere.
I know it all too
well.
The hell of not
eating to maintain
the high.
Food absorbs.
I used to go
six to ten days
without a bite.
The light goes out.
The brain begins to
eat itself.
She's starving.

Drinking has been an exercise in
lunacy and sorrow,
like jumping off a cliff,
for tomorrow's dead dreams.
The fruit of the vine should
be sweet and sentimental,
like mamas and moonlight.
With a fistful of memories and
a soul full of pain,
I try it all again;
I chase the phantom.

my hands are *****
as is my mind
as is my record
my hands are covered in earth

he tripped
not once, not twice
promised the wrong
he slipped
fell
stayed down

they made sure he'd stay down
taken from his son
his life, his place
his right
to watch the forsythias bloom
when they spring with yellow and hope

your boy is coming for you
coming to get you out
take you home
tuck you in
throw away your bottles
as they scream for you from the south

They grant him one wish
facing his fate in a cell
and he wants to see the forsythias bloom
and one blossom
blinks her eyes
with freedom

I slipped through a crack in the world

To a place where dreams lay dying

And a hundred empty bottles broke my fall

Invisible to all the stomping feet

Who would not see

Among the cans and the sidewalk garbage

You came and lifted me

***** blind and raging

Gave me wings

And mended the tear in my soul

Made me whole

So I would not fall again.

The way the chilled glass sits and liquid pours-
Soulful singing soothes the mind-
No wonder they go back to the liquor-
If I follow the tracks they lay- would I too
Find shelter in bubbles, therapy in fermented steam-
I might need a vice but no-

Such a classy act to chug from tap upside down-
Illegal now but legal Now-
To trick the brain into a floating void-
Oh how wonderful but-
For some reason I fear putting drink to lips
The burning down my throat.
So- in soulful bar, the glass sits on its rim
Await till I fall thin.
Till the day I crumble it sits.

Winter is so much colder when you're alone,
so much colder when you come home to an empty house,
dark, and you've to turn on the lights yourself,
when you know that no one has been waiting for you.

Winter is so much colder then,
when you bring a bottle home, in a black plastic bag,
and sit drinking on your bed, wondering
why the liquid that burns your throat
doesn't warm your heart at all.

Winter is so much colder then,
when you wake up in the middle of the night,
your feet freezing cold, and you know that holding them
in front of the heater will not be any use:
they--and you--need the warmth of somebody's flesh,
need to play hide-and-seek with another pair of toes.

Then, winter is so much colder then, when you're alone.