Dawn has seemed absent for eons in this moment;
forgotten, abandoned, broken.
The day lies behind me, blessed.
An abscess to its optimism, the dusk drains me off along with the light;
put down, thrown up, sticky.
My dad reached bottom thirty-three years ago this week,
touching down into the morgue in the basement at Everett General.
Gastly, ghostly, jaundiced.
Everett General, the hospital of my birth, a stone's throw from our home.
His bottle from that point forever empty (just one more for the road, formaldehyde straight up).
Rotting, rigor, relief.
The worst hangover is, in the end, no hangover at all (in fact, is nothing whatsoever).
slicing down to your belly revealing booze as your religion.
(the M.E. crosses herself: "we have a high priest among us today, my young interns.")
Not when you're cooking into ashes in the crematorium oven.
Not when your memories serve to brutalize the psyche of your children.
No. Soup. For. You. The bar is closed.
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