On Alcohol by Sam Sax

On Alcohol

 

my first drink was in my mother

my next, my bris. doctor spread red

wine across my lips. took my foreskin

 

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every time i drink     i lose something

 

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no one knows the origins of alcohol. tho surely an accident

before sacrament. agricultural apocrypha. enough grain stored up

for it to get weird in the cistern. rot gospel. god water

 

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brandy was used to treat everything

from colds to pneumonia

frostbite to snake bites

 

tb patients were placed on ethanol drips

tonics & cough medicines

spooned into the crying mouths of children

 

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each friday in synagogue a prayer for red

at dinner, the cemetery, the kitchen

spirits

 

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how many times have i woke

strange in an unfamiliar bed?

my head neolithic

 

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my grandfather died with a bottle in one hand

& flowers in the other. he called his drink his medicine

he called his woman

    she locked the door

 

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i can only half blame alcohol for my overdose

the other half is my own hand

that poured the codeine    that lifted the red plastic again & again &

 

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i’m trying to understand pleasure     it comes back

in flashes    every jean button thumbed open to reveal

a different man     every slurred & furious permission

 

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i was sober a year before [          ] died

 

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every time i drink     i lose someone

 

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if you look close at the process of fermentation

you’ll see tiny animals destroying the living body

until it’s transformed into something more volatile

 

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the wino outside the liquor store

mistakes me for his son