This poem is the sixth one written for January 2010′s Read Write Poem Mini-Challenge (to write six poems about starting over in six days). It was also written for Read Write Poem Prompt #111: Broken Chair. I ended up going back to the theme of alcoholism with this, the last poem in the series with the theme of “starting over” — perhaps because I knew someone who struggled with it and didn’t survive. I guess I keep hoping for redemption. I hope you enjoy the read.
-Nicole
P.S. To see the other mini-challenge poems that I am writing this month, click here.
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Electric, my burn and buzz brain
has brought me down to a broken chair,
the latest in a series of holy visions
bequeathed by delirium. This is how
you die of thirst in the desert with nothing but a
busted-up, empty-bellied ’71 Cadillac Fleetwood with a
crowd of empty beer cans lying scattered on the back seat. The beast
died three days ago, coughing out gas fumes and
retching out a death cry of metal scraping on metal from inside its
ancient steel throat. The sky echoes its paintjob in
faded, teal sick covered with rust. And there’s dust in
the breath of this desert, playing a dirt smoke harmony with
the sweet and sour stink slowly pouring from the mouths of
the beer cans. It’s a perfect, white trash sendoff
for a sweatshirt and steel-toed fool – which I am,
now kneeling in worship to a
figment with three legs.
My heart has been climbing
up my ribcage, that ladder of bone inside my
chest. It’s looking for the open jaws, the demon, the
rows of white teeth terror dripping
red like liquid hunger, like necks ripped open, like
crimson murder that slides easily off the blade when you’re
done with the deed. The snake’s stomach, three years empty
and crawling out through the mouth, past the cage of fangs, to
suck you into itself. And the blood moon,
the thirsty horsemen of rattle and bone,
the sky cracked apart and tumbling itself in suicide star letters
to the ground – they were here this morning to begin
celebrating my exit. They were going to take notes on
how oceans of drink danced me inside out to die here,
sinking into this ground like a withered doll. But fuck
them. Let’s get this over already. I’m sick to death of dying
in a delirium that drags me slow and dirty across the
floor of this desert. Three days has been
long enough.
I fold into myself,
lie down below the shadow of the broken chair, and
shut my eyes. Burnt orange blooms
on the back of my eyelids, but it is soon broken apart by
a fuzzed line of white that parts my tangerine dark
without dramatics, without trumpets, without a
white-bearded Bible sage and his staff. Nothing is
drowning except that dark, falling away into
cream-colored cut lines of cast sunlight onto a wall through a
nearby window as the fog lifts its last from my
eyes. I am clean, scrubbed of my sour and dirty skin,
wrapped in cotton stiffness, lying in a hospital bed at least
a hundred miles from home. A clear snake invades my skin
with its needle head, pouring its own saline life
into mine. My head aches from my journeys
into thirst wisdom and delirium dancing. And
this
is how it ends, and how it will
begin: drain the drink out of me in slow drops until it
releases its fangs from my neck. On the way down, it will
whip me with its tail, slap me with the vengeance
of letting go. I’ll take the bruises, wear ache like penance
on my skin. But at least I’m still alive. And I cannot keep running
anymore.
Written 1/25/10 and 1/26/10
© 2010 Nicole Nicholson. All Rights Reserved.
Stumble It!
Well done! Strong, present speaker. I root for him/her, and fear for him/her. Thank you so much for sharing this.
This is so powerful and emotional. Excellently done.
Hi Nicole,
Powerful and real. So many good lines, including:
a series of holy visions
bequeathed by delirium
It’s a perfect, white trash sendoff
for a sweatshirt and steel-toed fool
without dramatics, without trumpets, without a
white-bearded Bible sage and his staff
Chilling way of bringing that experience to life… as always, your mastery of language and method of interpreting these images are fantastic. I like how you move from literal to metaphorical and back again seamlessly here. Double plus good.
This just rolls off the tongue.Brilliant images,musical allusions,
expressing the torture and despair of the addict.I do hope at some point you receive the recognition you so richly deserve!
nicely done Nicole….congrats…and thanks for sharing thios….cheers
As usual it is superb! Congrats on a really nice poem!
Pamela
The snake image is really effective here.
It is powerful like the rest said. You do wrestle with the beast so well Nicole.
wow! This is powerful! I love it.
[...] Prompt # 112: The Narrative Wallpaper. I decided to continue the story from last week’s poem, Endgame. I wanted to see what happened to the speaker in the poem. I looked at a stretch of highway near [...]
A very compelling piece, a daring and radical interpretation of the prompt photo, yet still closely asociated with the images and the colors in the photo. I love how the poem begins in the bleakest delirium and then wakes up in the hospital, but then the hospital is filled with the same demons (snakes) as the delirium. A sense of no escape from the vision of horror. And the colors on the outside become colors on the inside of the eyes — again, no escape from the vision of horror. Very well executed! I am so very sorry that your life has been affected in some ways by that terrible disease of alcoholism.
[...] Read Write Poem Prompt #114: All Over The Map. I decided to continue the narrative that began in “Endgame” and continued in “Emmaus”. The words led me to a dream sequence experienced by the [...]
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Hello all. Thank you for stopping by, reading, and commenting. My apologies in being a little late in responding.
@Yousei and Therese : Believe me, I’m rooting for him too. Like I said, the person I knew didn’t survive his ordeal. Maybe these poems are my weird way of trying to rescue him, although I know it’s really not possible.
-Nicole