No waste – Just taste
Denied every other pleasure.
A long time gone,
facing torment beyond measure.
Left reassured that it’s all over,
abandoned past that haunts forever.
Standing on top of a pain felt so long,
so many months into years, I’ve been wrong.
First to admit
that I faced down some shit,
but that sure as fuck
ain’t the end of the story.
Pick up where I never left off.
Do something with the room,
now I’ve moved off.
Take over a new view
and know that will pay off.
I can do no more,
so let me sleep the day away.
Not what it was before,
it comes to grip you every day.
There is no heart left for the wicked,
no time left for the stupid,
who will do it – just like I did.
Never learning – they fall 6 feet down.
I’ve lived underground until now.
Hold onto us –
The bent and shadowed,
wasted, wounded,
as we live another day
with a chance to get through it.
If I don’t succumb,
lose my heart and grow numb,
or drink myself dumb;
I’ll succeed in all I’ve done.
HG – 2000-2005
An evocative poem about the crushing weight of addiction. I was using cocaine 22 hours a day, drinking 21 hours a day then taking benzos to crash for a couple of hours. I was crushed, I was a journalist but I couldn’t even read a paragraph in a newspaper let alone write anything. I couldn’t even have a conversation of longer than 2 minutes or look someone in the eye as my attention span had collapsed. Luckily I was forced into treatment by my family and I was 11 years clean at the beginning of this year. All my addictions and mental health problems – I had enough to fill a football stadium – are now in recovery and I am happier than I have ever been.
Thank you for sharing your story! I know all too well what you went through, fact is, I find it hard to identify with the person who wrote all this. It was a lifetime ago, but I felt sharing it was good therapy, as well as beneficial to re-launching myself into writing. It was what I dreamed of doing (still do) and went to school to learn, all those years ago.