Mainlining

I used an old rusty
	fountain pen

to shoot a poem
	into my arm

I began to 
	piss butterflies

and I fell down
		down
			down

and when I hit the floor
	I threw up stanza
		after stanza
			of flowery rainbow words

I managed to pull it together
I staggered down the street
and fell into a store
and bought a black beret
and turtleneck
and smoked a pack of cigarettes
and drank a million cups of coffee
and finally I was coming down
	off my poem

when I ran into my dealer

tucked under his arm
	like a preacher man carrying a bible
	he had
		“In the Clear: A Contemporary Canadian Poetry Anthology”

he ripped out a page like a doctor tearing off a script
	“Try this, it will blow your mind”
	“No thanks,” I said “I’ll stick with prose”

I went home
and chugged back some Hemingway
and chased it down with a little Steinbeck
and watched my hand
stop shaking.

© Christian McPherson