Monday, November 4, 2013

poem of the day 11.04.13


what we did before drinking

in the middle
of the three day drought
that i know in my heart of hearts
will soon be gone

i say to my wife
i don’t remember what it was that we did
on nights when we didn’t drink

i mean i have no clue

me neither, she says

then we are both silent

we watch the clock
as we’ve become apt at doing
during this forced sobriety

we tell each other things like
the day seems really fast now
or i slept so much better

but the two of us still keep looking
at all of the clocks in the house
wishing time away until one of us breaks

we read, my wife says

we do that now, i say

we watched television, she offers
a lot of television

we had cigarettes, i say

i still miss cigarettes eleven years later
and i’d start smoking again today if i could

they’ll kill you, my wife says

we laugh at that

because that’s why we stopped pounded so much hooch
then we go back to watching the clock

6:49
6:50
6:51

the water we poured sitting there
on the coffee table like some rejected love child

the cat pacing
wondering where the clink of the ice cubes
the exuberant life talk
and bitching about work went

ah, there are so many good things
to run into the ground, i think

love
vices
talent
and god

that trying to recover them
sometimes feels like a sin

i get up off the couch and grab my keys

where are you going? my wife asks

to get us some wine, i say

she’s silent for a moment

6:52 and counting

okay, she answers
okay.

                       

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