Three, Maybe Four

a shot of bourbon, swirled and enjoyed in the mouth, chased with a beer, and two ibuprofen... the arthritis eases until three, maybe four, in the morning. age silently aches, as if the heart and the body play together on an empty corner, no change in the cup! but the mind still remembers... smells, feelings, bulletproof and hungry, always hungry. dawns alone on a mountaintop, making love in the snow. fires, good fires, poets exchanging madness, and later, children being born... making things by hand, the sweat and the promise. and clouds that wept over things we thought we knew. now the clock on the wall ticks with the footfalls of ghosts. haunted, always haunted, and dammit, still hungry! till three, maybe four, in the morning...