Do we get a second chance?

Romance, a thing of the past,
growing up sagging parts at 30,
life is lived between five and twelve,
then shoots down the ladder of
never-never.

What if you drank alcohol at five years
old on Dad’s lap?

What if you fell in love with
a girl named Anne in Third Grade?

Then never told her until you were
in your middle twenties, a part of
a twelve step group that honored
truth, needed truth, and gave you
God for your troubles.

Love is a fifth of vodka in the face
of the ignorant.  We come out of Mom
not knowing a thing, perfect bliss
minus the hellacious rush of light
and reality felt the moment we
breathe.

“Let me back in!” is not an option
as you keep breathing, if healthy.

I stayed in the hospital for two weeks,
a blue baby—they helped me to
breathe, and what did they think
at home?

The devil is all around us, we live
on the dragon’s back, wide the path
to destruction—you cannot change any
of it!

With a lion’s roar you win some ground,
but tell her you love her.

If not, you’ll be like me.

Writing about love on the lonely
sea, the dock of doom cluttered with
broken sails, amends and promises.

I was rude instead of honest;
I found fault in her eventually!

I SCREWED UP!

Can you ever go back to third grade?
I’d tell her I loved her.  I’d ask her
to play tennis.  I’d take her to the
movies…

But no; I was with the devil since
five, bourbon on Dad’s lap, he and
Mom pretending at divorce while Jesus
just shakes his head!

Man can never separate what the LORD
God has bound together, so Anne:

I’m sorry.

Bound now to bedevilment and alcoholism,
to girls, gals and chicks who treat me bad.

I could have married Anne, but no
I had to fail!  The poet’s tale!

What could I write with the wind of
perfection behind my back; I’d be, sadly—
not a writer at all.

I’d be closer to a “doctor”—a know-
it-all…

I’d be something I was not; “God” has me
just where he or she wants me:

Writing Truth, fiction, lies that supply
the counter and cupboards of jokes and
stories to tell our children.

Warnings to not drink flammable liquids;
to always be true, grab a god first, as it
helps with the courage to be you…

And tell her again and again that you love
her.  Again and again that you love her.

Again and again that you love her; making
up and making amends that you love her…

I screwed up.  I…

Still love her.