SHOOTING UP

I was clean for a year
one whole year one
month and five days.
Well, technically at least.
Thinking about it doesn’t really
count, does it?

But driving hours to see you counts.
Contacting you and asking for your help
counts. And coming to your bed
with nothing but a slick black slip
for you to slide up over my head
definitely does count.

My friend saw me later.
He said I glowed and wanted
me to push up my sleeves
to search for needle marks.
It showed.

I am powerless over my addiction.
You are the God I pray to as I
bend my head over you and take
you in as deep as you can go.
It’s your name I call out, head
tipped back, hair spilling all around.
You are the jones I’d sell anything
to ride, fingers in the curling hair,
watching, watching you.

It’s the sounds you make, the boyish
look you get, the quiet way you know
I know so you won’t have to really
ask. It’s the hunger for the drug of you
that lays the needle on the table
within my reach. This from which
I can never turn away.

© Joan Barton, 2001

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