Twenty one is the
last age to be excited
about turning

Once you're past thirty
birthdays are just
lying and not getting
presents

This next year is the last
time I'll have to pretend
to enjoy getting older

but it's one day less
than a month away
from my twenty first birthday

and I don't drink

the memory is foggy, but it’s there
I used to think I had dreamt it;
his hands on my shaking body, his breath that smelled of alcohol
the images were so distant that they almost felt unreal

my therapist used to ask me if I was sure it really happened
and to be fair, I wasn’t
but why would a ten year old imagine something so twisted?
and why would the thought of my own dreams make my stomach sick?

I spent years wondering what really happened
and I finally know it was real
because whenever I replay the events I remember
I am back
I can feel the cold air on my skin and the tenseness in my muscles
his voice telling me to come closer
his hands on my shaking body, his breath that smells of alcohol
my dreams have never made me feel this way

Superb Owl sat in front of his TV.
The more he ate, the more touchdowns he'd see.
The more he drank, the better did his team.
Let's all share Superb Owl's superb scheme!

It's Saturday night, 4 o'clock in the morning. And I'm believing I just had the best night of my life.

I never drink for the taste, but for the small percentage of freedom of my everyday life.

Disregarding what I do to my children and my wife. I drink to black out and I drink to forget life.

Unlike my father I never drink to black out. But I also do not drink for the taste, everyone needs a escape.

I will stand there with a girl I don't know, and I drink slow to drown and torture my sorrow. Hoping one day my soul will be hollow and I turn out nothing like you.

Stuck in a drinking rut
On a two week ******
Well actually
It's more like two decades
But I had to work the night shift
January 11th

Faded stains of spilled bourbon
dot the weathered nightstand’s surface
like stars speckle a clear midnight sky
Each commemorates a prop of courage
swigged to help forge another day

Bras, slips, heels and flats
pepper the soiled carpet
reflections of the many
nightly transgressions now
impediments which fleck her soul

Her frontal lobe
harbors distortions
from her past
forgiven by those who know her
forgotten by others

Rain pelts her window
rat-tat, rat-tats against the panes
compulsively splatters the door
flings open her mind
to let today’s downpour
splash away
any trace of her anguish