PostPoems Be Artistic. Be Creative. Be Inspired!

I quit drugs for this?

I gave up life on the road

traveling from city to city

going to shows, beaches,

museums, bars and parks

partying it up all night

living a life where the nightmares

were hallucinations

and not reality

where surrealistic twists

made perfect sense

and you could always

blame it on the doses

when the beer flowed freely

and the fragrance of opium

kept olfactory senses enraptured

when another city

was always on the horizon

and home went by names

like Marriot and Sheraton

when money was made on the sly

and freedom lived on every corner

when ether wasn’t exclusive

to scifi movies and tv series

and all the fun was allowed

when yelling voices could be avoided

and assholes could be refused service

and you ran the show yourself

when Dali was witnesses

with hash brownies and synthetic mescaline

the doctors knew nothing

and the doses gave good trips

and didn’t threaten to turn bad

cause Sun Ra was a little weird

and now I get up every day

I’m a responsible adult now

fully functional in society

and I feel like I’m getting shafted

every morning when I wake

have to hear the harangues

and get assigned menial tasks

and all I can think of

is what a fucking fool I am

to have sold out the dream

for something not better

than a bloody nosed coke dream

come home from work; tired

back twisted; fingers all cut up

and to think—I used to criticize

the things whores did for money

7-12-95