Nine Years On, Or Nearly So

Nine Years On, Or Nearly So

All your life you’d made your threats,

then hedged the bets as they say, then called

and somewhat bluffed your way

day and day and day through

the years I knew you in a tranquil-

ized haze.  Having played

every card, more than three-quarters

lost and gone, all those queens

and kings you’d stood in knee-deep

in the trenches for to ante up

with deuces…

tired isn’t how it’d come to be that way.

I have to say, sober you were bold

to go all the way in until you played away

your whole life, even the low cards, fuck

if you couldn’t bluff! Aces and eights

were your favorite hand

and every time, every time! you’d clean

up and try to cash in the chips all

at once and I stashed some

so you’d have it to fall

back on and you’d be on a carousel

of winning for a while and I’d leave you

be left by you and I let you be

when I grew up and took it in the chin

your upper-cut from the hip

when they called, when my son turned

three (you’d sworn off booze)

and all that winning went down

your throat and you broke open

on the bathroom floor…

Tell me: who can gamble, I mean let’s be

honest here, who can gamble

any other way than close to the bone

when the show’s really about

to close and the toilet’s over-

flowed and the cards are sticking

to the shit and piss

of your tired untamable life and the kids

the kids all us four

come one by one to your bed

and kiss your sunk cheek and say good

bye and high

tail it home or out of our mind

but one last time I stay

I stay I stay the whole length

of the night.  Through all the gurgle

you fold you fold your old stroke-

curled hand open as much

as it can be, pinched pills a ghost

in your throat, your deck scattered still

scattering by the cold late incoming wind