Alcohol's Apologist

A glass of wine has always been welcome at my table, loosening my fingers on the page. One beer, plus a few, has resulted in conversation so clear -when otherwise muddled smiles would have loomed between some stranger and myself. Alcohol kept me at it, pushing the limits of work and frustration. With Alcohol, I've screamed into the night and barked at the moon, gnawed at and sobbed into ruddy fingers. These are not things sober people do, to their loss, I suppose. When I needed to stop smoking, Alcohol was there to pinch hit. When my job, for the five-hundredth day in a row, was to scrub another toilet... Alcohol swept me off to greener pastures. Why does Mother Russia endure her winters? How does an amputee stare at that space where she once bent her knee? My God, all those lonely grandmothers waiting only for next Christmas, then Easter, then? Then, for tonight, like last night, there's a plastic jug to fill her weeping cup. For all these lonely souls, this is a jug of good friends. That fat congressman, eyes screwed up and red fist clenched against change, Alcohol loosens his tongue to Mercy or Peace. When he's caught in that cherry glow, heart pushing up past his throat and strangles his greedy mind. Was Roosevelt sober? Was Churchill? God no! It was George Bush who lacked a glass, and Jimmy Carter, mere placeholders between Nixon and Clinton. Now THEY were drinkers! Destined for hell, no doubt, but real leaders to cheer and curse upon. It's time to move on I suppose, some tee-totaller's lock against Demon Rum, Christ but I can't face that white sheet of abstinence. But Spirits can no longer be my friend and solace. But Booze is my only comfort at parties insisting a drink in hand. I must decline I suppose, be willing to have just none, but graciously? And then again?? Me??? Decline the next???? A good drunk (quoting another) said that when he was sober, "The days stretched out like a gray paste. Occasionally, to break the madness, there'd be a good day", and this kept him going, waiting for good days. It fell apart finally; he got tired of waiting. In that light, it truly seems like madness, but there's no right day for it — because good days are not my aim. So, despite the inevitable paste and placeholder status, I'm aiming towards the back of the wagon, at least after this next...