his mama’s wing
I knew a woman who’s husband was an alcoholic. He couldn’t break free. She loved him deeply. She had 2 children with him. They had a life. The booze slowly eroded the edges, then worked its way inward to the center. To the center of their life and to the center of his body. At the end, there wasn’t much, not much of a home, not much money, not much happiness. It was excruciatingly heartbreaking. It lead to a separation… which lead to renewed hope of recovery… which lead to a desperate begging on his part to come home.. to start again. But it was too late.
What is the lesson of this man’s life? His crumbling? Once can never know.. except to stand aching as the pain of his story sinks into our own guts and maybe makes us want to do all we can to want to live fully without a substance slowly ripping our precious lives to shreds.
his mama's wing crushed, broken before he even started weakened by the shortcomings of his father sleeping under his mamma’s wing he could imagine and dream but the damage was immense and the drink was heaven sent the beer, the wine and then the whiskey became his wobbly backbone his manhoods constant wicked test he tried and tried, and tried again each time weaker than the last trying to become a ‘real man' but his yearnings got forgot in the years of slurred tongue and hopeless laughter slowly crumbling over inside into his bent and broken dreams, rattling chatter slipping deeper into his wretched disgust aching to throw his body in front of a truck thankfully mamma came along, one more time, again his wife, his mother, he couldn’t tell it didn’t matter a recovery home... he called it the slammer then his heart attack, triple bypass no more drink, but now the drugs hanging on by one weak rung he told me he might have cancer of the lung some time went by before he died, alone and stayed that way for 3 long days did his spirit hover over as he watched his fatal heart attack as it slammed him up against the wall inside his chest? looking down upon himself in his staggering loss his precious life ravaged by how much the drink had cost he had finally gotten clean you see, and had wanted to go home to his wife, his woman, to that soft place of imaginary dreams and peaceful sleep he had been finally ready to try to be the man that he had forsaken for the drink but the Goddess can be a harsh teacher because once you loose her you have to stand in, and walk, and live your manhood and prove your strength to be allowed again to try and reach her his spirit now tucked up high, under his mamma’s angelic wing curling into himself, while his innocent un-lived manhood weeps (c) 2021 Christina James Circa 2011
Credits: Header photo by Tim Moss from Unsplash.com.
His Mamma’s Wing is so damn good. The language flows. The sounds of words that belong together. Words strung on a sentence like pearls on a necklace.
Thank you Al.. I feel this was one of my greatest poems to date… It digs deep…