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Published by Trash to Treasure Lit, April 1, 2025

Barbies wear muselet helmets
Sherlock journals clues
Cricket-stump bin clinks dismissal
Bread is hard with mouldy middle
Cheese is soft with tinted velvets
All in greens and blues

Newspapers a carpet curtain
Other signs of note
Sinks drain-weary, veiled by dishes
Door blocked from unseen militias
Ashtrays strain with liquid burden
Mangled ends afloat

Late-night fry exudes lard landslide
Interesting leads
Window signs of blunt force impact
Latches show no signs of contact
Perpetrated from the inside
Casual misdeeds

Bottles strewn with empty glasses
Evidence galore
Christmas tree is snapped, now supine
Couch chair at confusing incline
Wasting roast potato passes
Solo on the floor

Shrouded dark in grown-up questions
Case remains unsolved
Pre-teen sherlocks are defeated
Unaware that help is needed
Claiming all adult transgressions
Guilelessly involved

Knowledge comes with maturation
Young gumshoe, take heart
Heavy is the comprehension
Adulthood in wise dimension
Toughest form of education
Living will impart

Trauma is by drink upstaged
Of subterfuge beware
Brace yourself for understanding
Bottle is a sly red herring
Denouement is disengaged
You won’t find it there

Life perspective is revealing
Sooner follow pain
Core of more investigation
Drink was only compensation
Obfuscating tricky healing
Alloyed with the leaden feeling
Undiscovered chain

You were just a fledgling hawkshaw
Grant yourself some grace
Rest the blame that you digested
Drop the anger you invested
Hopping off the guilt-rage seesaw
‘Case closed’ in its place

Sobriety is overrated
Bottle recess for your mind
Pain and time are complicated
Pain and mind are lubricated
Time and mind in competition
Time and pain aligned

Little drops of consolation
Shiny sparkly pools of bliss
Softly viewed through condensation
Revenants by invitation
Bottle-born in resurrection
Noone else to miss

There exists the true addiction
Passing time with those you lost
Pain is not the real affliction
Loss of love holds little friction
Time can pass in all directions
Overlook the cost

Bottles as chrono-transporter
Meaningless in time and pain
Chosen over bricks and mortar
Home inside the pain exporter
Caught inside the time remover
Genie trapped again

Traps are not a solo prison
Bottle is no picky thief
Locked outside your final mission
Circumscribed to watch and listen
Grasping as the brown glass darkens
Wading into grief

My name is Jack.
I am a hero, some may say it is useless calling myself that, but it is true.
I have slayed monsters, and demons
Fallen in love a couple of times,
learned to spot the dangerous ones.

Although onwards I continue my journey,
To conquer unknown lands,
Discover Love- the one and only,
An imponderable Love,
That I know,
She doesn’t.

Yet, I will still go on,
For my name is Jack,
Slayer of monsters and demons,
Seeker of love.

Mysterious Paradoxes

I just watched a man
take a token from the hand
of a life long friend,
again!
For the power of relief
from poison and pride.
A marker of 31 years
in recovery
from the hell
of addiction and drink.

Face Fear
face first
fearless and thorough from start to finish


“When I face fear, I’m given courage;
When I help my brother, I help myself.”


A third life is possible if the second try fails.
Even then it’s still the first:
3 in 1 like the ghost
and the father and the sun.
From our mother we are birthed
and led to find a guiding hand
and to help others who are lost
find the path and the light
and the love of a life
free from the powers
of persuasion by the devil
and his friends.

A simple solution -

Surrender to Win!

Amen… again
And again and again,
‘Til it ends.
It begins
In a place
Among friends;
One day at a time.
Everyday can be mine
If I find what I found
the first time I really tried.



Common solution
1005 old shell
11:19am
2-23-24

Goodbye Bottle Bandit

What a face she had . Shaped like a heart with a heart shaped mouth
with the most beautiful head of hair
you ever saw.
underneath it all a fragile, beautiful soul
She was funny
she was classy.
She was smart
She was the kind of woman who would force homemade cheesecake on you
and things us swamp Yankees had  never heard of - like artichoke gnocchis
She was mine for a while,
or I was hers
you could never really own  a girl like that.
And I know she loved me.
But Jim beam and jack Daniels were the real men in her life
Only now do I understand
Something I could never understand
Something nobody should understand
How a girl Buddy Cianci  once said was the most beautiful girl in Providence
Died alone sitting upright on a couch.
One of her men in her hand.

There were men in the past who are used her and  abused her
I don’t wish them ill
but I don’t wish them well
She once said  that her mother was her only friend
I said “what about me?”
What about you? She said.
I’m your friend .
No, you’re my man .
I was proud to be .
Until those two southern boys edged me out.

Truth is I’ll never understand
Neither does  her mother
I hope nobody understands .
I don’t wanna live in a world where people understand that kind of thing .
Bottle bandit .
My bottle bandit.

(Why do you look at drinking as such a nasty thing?)

Oh, no reason.
It’s a silly little beverage,
That twisted and turned,
My childhood to shambles,
All because it was who ‘he’ was.

Oh, you’re right,
I’m just being dramatic,
It was just my innocence,
After all,
Silly me.