Sonnet to the Drunk Poet
Published in
May 15, 2024
Those bare pages that torment the sober soul,
dull missives devoid of inspired musing.
In distress, I surrender frail control
over sense and reasons beyond losing.
Ethyl alcohol yields glimpsed relief,
fluid confidence, burning like a purge,
instant effects that stir timid beliefs,
freeing a feeble ego to emerge.
Listen, then, I might feel so I can speak
what I perhaps think, or thought I must know,
penning slurred verse aloud, words I seek
burst forth florid flotsam in torrent flow.
But later, I blink through throbbing regret,
what an aching poet hopes to forget.
Gregg SAPP is the author of the “Holidazed” series of satires
