When I Drink

When I drink,

the ever-present pain

in my back dulls

just enough to help me forget

what it is to be human.

When I drink,

you become both

exceedingly attractive

and evermore attainable

within the same passed hour.

When I drink,

the shitty music playing

at this bar, club, hole-in-the-wall pub

takes a turn for the tolerable.

My memories of every song

I’ve ever heard become more fluid,

filling in the gaps where this track is lacking.

When I drink,

my dancing improves drastically,

both in my head and the space I fill.

The muscle spasms are likely exactly the same,

but when swung with far less reservation,

appear better, sexier, bolder.

When I drink,

my teeth tend toward numb

and my tongue unfurls to flap out

every word that’ll fly on the wind.

They propel me forward into what would

have otherwise been a night of dead seamen.

When I drink,

I become more confident, more direct,

more the person I feel I ought to be.

I’ve always been an enabler,

but only liquor lets me put the springboard

under my own feet – vaulting me forward

toward a flight that only gets more exciting

with the prospect of a bigger crash.

When I drink,

I always overlook the warning label

hidden on the bottle’s back corner.

It screams, in its loudest, tiny-print voice:

May cause delusions of grandeur.

These will be fierce, fun, and loyal,

but they will be short-lived.

The body will only turn a blind eye

to the mind’s tricks long enough to bed her.

Then he will slug himself in the gut and purge

everything that temporarily made him think

he could ever be greater

than mortal.