Whiskey

4:40 drink
AM or PM...
It don't matter none
Either way...
I know what this means....
Long gone now and
No sense bothering
With simplistic tears....

It's been thirteen years
Since I drank a swig....
Thirteen years since I was a kid
Unaware of how to be truly responsible
For a child left in my care...
Remember how I just left him there?
Neglectful...
Thieving...
Drunk....
She asked me to care for her child and I
Dragged a razor along my
Inner wrist
Between loads of laundry...
High schoolers
Were so much different
In her day...

Whiskey--
I should have told her
To pour my paycheck
Straight into a tumbler...
But I was a child
So I stole it from her...
8, 9, 10, 11 AM...
Sweet mouthwatering candy....
And I...the foolish diabetic
Clueless to my condition...
Craved that sugary sweet
Retched
Moment
When the liquid lingers
Like vapor
In the back of the throat....
My face puckered
Without a thought....

I remember the static
Radio, and the
Blur of the kitchen
When my young teenage body
Had drank it's fare share...
Feeling sufficiently
Confused...

Whiskey--
The hypnotic dancer
Potent breath of an
Unwelcome kiss...
An embrace like
Boa's constriction
in my distant
Consciousness...
Present actions
Perfectly preformed
Through non-attachment...
Not a drop spilled...
Not a whimper released...

Sweet solitude
And the anesthetic effect
Along my veins
Where the sickness
Casually cut...

And yet I boast now
To toss back the
4:40 drink..
As though I've reclaimed
The sacred
Holy Grail...