I’m a safe drinker nowadays (& besides, I love this photo, & Midnight Sun Brewery makes some good stuff!), but back in the day I drank waaaaay too much. Yet it played a role in my letting go, eventually, of self-hatred. It, & my friends. Same poem I mentioned in my last post.
Prosody geeks: this is in the form of a pantoum (albeit a loose use of the form). Gonna have to get around to getting a new WordPress theme. This one isn’t wide enough for this poem’s longer lines, & WordPress doesn’t seem to permit hanging indents. Bugga.
Ode to Alcohol
O Alcohol, you were an instrument of my deliverance.
In that long-ago dormitory room with Heidi and Julie
you loosed my tight fist of self.
Words came, however slurred, however slow.
In that long-ago dormitory room with Heidi and Julie,
in a Boston bar, a bar in Anchorage, an East Anchorage trailer with Lori and Sharon,
words came, however slurred, however slow.
You were like grease, like WD-40 on an old tight rusted bolt.
In a Boston bar, a bar in Anchorage, an East Anchorage trailer with Lori and Sharon,
my flesh stank of liquor and self-condemnation.
You were like grease, like WD-40 on an old tight rusted bolt —
it took the weight of all friends, all love leaning on the wrench of me to break it loose.
My flesh stank of liquor and self-condemnation.
When the gaping space between stars swallowed me,
it took the weight of all friends, all love straining on the rope of me to pull me back.
I woke to late August snow on the mountains.
When the gaping space between stars swallowed me,
my drunkenness boiled away into the vacuum.
I woke to late August snow on the mountains.
All friends, all love stood at ease with me, regarding them.
My despair boiled away into the vacuum.
You loosed my tight fist of self.
All friends, all love stood at ease, rejoicing with me.
O Alcohol, you were an instrument of my deliverance.
[November 16, 1995]
MS’s summer Pilsner is the best lager brewed in Alaska I’ve tasted in years.
your poem works too.