when i get drunk in new york city,
i remember home, the way she was.
i like to drop my eyelids,
see the stars out in the middle of nowhere, texas
and i like to feel how warm my mother’s hugs are.
i like to get buzzed and imagine my sisters laugh,
and how happy my father was
to just have me there with him, beside him, existing with him.
all of these come back to me
at the bottom of gas station wine bottles.
 

and sometimes i find mountains
in cheap whiskey from the liquor store just off campus,
I am again in the chilled and rain rusted bed of my father’s Ford
after a six pack of Shiner
and it saddens me,
to chase nostalgia in intoxicants
because the past flows only with the moon
and come sunrise,
i will have lost it all again to memory.
 

but you,
you in all of your magic and mystery
and beautiful silk words, your imperfect perfection,
you have tricked my heart into feeling at home,
and you seem to be a love like the past,
and in you there is no need for drink
because the sight of your smile alone,
has me staggering my steps
and slurring speech, and hopefully hopeless.
 

in you, there is mountains and all God’s creations
that I have ever laid eyes upon.
and the only equivalent to staring towards stars in the cold metal bed,

is laying at once beside you and meeting your eyes.
and I am not an alcoholic, I have no liquid reliances,
but I have begun to crave you beyond my evenings.
You have me day drunk on dreams of the two of us.
for you are much too good to be true,
and there is no wine, no whiskey nor beer
coursing in my liver,
only you pulsating
in my imagination and heart.
and try as hard as i might
to rail against this empty existence,
you are making
an addict out of me.