by Kaitlyn Stone

                               in a slur of sadness
       words stumbled from your lips
like drunken demons from the dark
                    abyss you wished to drop down into
                               in an attempt to drain your pain
                      with fermented grains of wheat
            and whiskey, to bite the bitterness

a disease of desperation

         which drowns the prisoner
                   not the pain
                              flooding the blood with frailty
                  and sorrow
                             still with room to spare for
despair: a black sparrow
             darting between branches of the body

             so, I sob—not for the arrows
                       you shot blindly in the dark at me
             but for the misery throbbing inside you
that no drink can bring death to

                    and I pray for you
to discover the strength blood brings
          when acceptance is reached
                   to learn how love can help
                              the addicted
          gain independence again
                  to know you were wrong
                             when you said
I am alone
          and that it is only true
                        if you want it to be
                                    

Kaitlyn Stone is a senior at University of South Florida, pursuing a major in Creative Writing and a minor in Environmental Science and Policy.  Her favorite bookstore is Shakespeare & Company in Paris, France, and if the scent of old used books was a perfume, she’d wear it every day.