Breadcrumb #530

SARAH BRIDGINS

I miss my father the most
when I'm hungover.
I want him to tell me it's okay
to be a mess,
to spend a day not knowing
if you want to eat the world
or throw it up,
crying at videos of kittens
rescued from garbage cans,
and then at yourself
for being the worst kind of sick,
the kind where no one
feels sorry for you.

 I want him to tell me
I'm not like my mother
who drank until
there was no one left
to tell her not to,
who drank until
my father stopped,
because one of them
had to be sober enough
to keep a baby alive.

 Last night, I sat on the sidewalk
outside of the bar,
head spinning, waiting
for my friend to pay.
A man walked toward me,
and I watched, paralyzed,
too fucked up to ask
what he wanted
or stop him
if it came to that.

 As he passed by
I thought of the book I was reading,
It by Stephen King,
how the monster takes the form
of its victim's greatest fear,
and scared myself.

• • •