Old Flame
Our love was hot and steamy.
Banged up real bad in an
accident, she was started
on pain killers.
Sally’s eyes are sunken.
Dark circles hang.
Her skin is ghastly gray.
Her hands tremble.
Her voice rattles.
She hasn’t slept.
Quivering lips are anguish.
Gone the shiny locks
of blonde hair;
now a matted mess.
Once gorgeous
in an odd way.
Now a lump of clay.
Selling her body.
Her story unfolds;
whispered in tears.
Damn that white
crystal meth.
DTs
Shrieks,
laden with anguish
ping-pong off the walls.
Purple pelicans wounded
by arrows,
screeching.
Red orangutans twist
and contort,
beating their chests
trying to squash bugs.
Fiery pokers jab.
Coming down;
three day binge.
Soaked to the gills;
body crying for more.
On The Streets
Talking to him almost every day
as he goes about his routine;
Telling me 42 empty beer
cans will buy a bottle of wine.
For his age, he is adroit at climbing
into a dumpster, plastic bag in hand.
His only possession, a battered grocery
cart. He lives under the bridge on 7th
Street.
He claims he graduated from the local
University with a degree in chemistry.
He started drinking when his new bride
ran off with another man. In drunken
stupors, he cries out her name.
I give him a couple of bucks on l
occasion. He’s effusive with his thanks.
The drink demons owns him. He can’t
break the cycle. As I am heading home,
I see him passed out in an alley.
Battered
Black and blue; raw flesh.
agony drips.
Escaping father’s iron fists
by hiding in dark corners of the mind.
Mother can’t stop it, impotent.
She weeps.
Savage beatings.
Confiding in his one true friend;
sobbing, crying out the pain.
His friend is in his mind.
Father is drunk again;
taking off his belt.
The buckle tears bloody gashes.
Escaping again;
watching indivisible tropical fish.
Scars on the body
will heal, but not those in the mind.
Now a cipher in a human warehouse.
Fried
He was catatonic; didn’t move.
His eyes never blinked.
He had to be dressed and fed.
He was withering away.
None of the medications seemed
to help.
His brain had been fried.
There was no flicker of response
when the staff talked to him.
He was a vegetable; his face was still,
but he wore a silly grin.
He had been this way for years.
Addicted to alcohol, he hit the streets
living in a cardboard box.
One day when he ran out of money,
he got the DTs. So he drank a gallon
of paint thinner. His brain is now
scrambled eggs.
