sugar & pornography

          it is said the first step to recovery
          is admitting you have a problem

                                                  i read that it has been scientifically
                                                  established that birds dream about singing

          the step before the first step to recovery is googling
          “porn addiction” in an incognito browser window

                                                  a dream happens inside a parenthesis
                                                  like a finger touching its own knee

          i quit the pills when i get lost on the way
          to the bathroom & piss on the floor

                                                  when i say i dream about the ocean i mean
                                                  i dream about where the water flirts with the land

          i don’t drink for a year & i miss the harbor
          its tongue tide, wet rippling beach jaw cove

                                                  in my dreams i taste desire sweetly
                                                  so in my dreams i must still be 12 years old

          it’s sobriety if you don’t count the shopping
          & gossip & sugar & pornography

                                                  a bird’s dreamsong is a dress rehearsal
                                                  so he can perform without a wrong note

          what should i quit
          to become a happy person

                                                  what if it happened many times
                                                  & each morning i forget

          what if i dream my first step every night
          so someday i’ll wake up just knowing

                                                  how sing it perfectly
                                                  all the way to the end

Catherine Weiss is a poet and illustrator based in Western Massachusetts. Their work has been published or forthcoming in Up the Staircase Quarterly, Freezeray Poetry, Voicemail Poems, Jersey Devil Press, The Mantle, Drunk in a Midnight Choir, Noble/Gas Quarterly, and Slamfind.   WEB

THE GALLERY
BACK