Addiction poem for second thoughts
maybe when I said never again I meant
asleep like coral bones heavy as a pair of hands
on my shoulders as certain to return to life
as the part of me still in that bar in New Orleans
where a man tells me there are worms living
inside him and I see reality dissolve like a pill
casing becoming only worship smoke spilling
kudzu and crabgrass from its delirious lungs
for years I am convinced of anything anyone says
with certainty maybe because I understood
I could change no one’s mind not even my own
which was a kind of medicine in my familiar
mouth the hands I held up to him when
he bared his wrists pinpricked with stars as if
to say I believe you I believe you
CAROLINE RICHARDS is a third year MFA candidate at Virginia Commonwealth University. She serves as the managing editor emerita of Blackbird.