god (for Thoughtjotter)

[Thoughtjotter]

"Claws for the Beast" inspired me to post this poem.

god
I hold my breathe.
I twist my tongue inside my mouth, as
I exert just the right amount of pressure on the syringe.
I push it down onto the cotton lying in the spoon.
I slowly pull back on the plunger.
My breath goes out as the fluid slowly steals its way up the hollow plastic shaft,
a release that is almost orgasmic: anticipation of what is to come.
I lay the needle carefully aside, not wanting to catch the point on anything and dull it.
I take out one of my several bandannas.
I quickly, but carefully, wrap it around my left arm.
I tie it in a slip knot that I can release by pulling it with my teeth.
My breath is coming faster now, short controlled breaths, in the top of my lungs.
I open and close my left fist.
I watch, fascinated, as the vein begins to rise above the skin.
I rub my finger up and down the vein, caressing it, as a lover would caress a nipple.
I pick up the paper square that encloses the alcohol swab.
I tear it open with my teeth. Removing the swab,
I run it up and down the vein. Ritualistically,
I clean and prepare it to receive the holy sacrament.

I am a fastidious acolyte, not because I am naturally so, but, at the moment,
I have the time, and the better vestments of my religion. At the moment,
I have sterile saline to wet down the powder.
I have clean cotton through which to strain it, and a sharp new syringe in which to put it. In the past,
I have used the water out of toilets to wet down the powder.
I have used cotton out of the butt of a used cigarette.
I have used my own spit to wipe the dirt off my arm.
I have sharpened a dull, much used needle, on a book of matches,
to get it sharp enough, to pierce my skin: a mini-crucifixion, stigmata from my god.

I need no Romans, nor a Pilot, nor a Judas.
I am a willing sacrifice, and I have sacrificed everything for my god.
I have been the lowly worshiper, begging for scraps, and
I have been the high priest. At those times, when
I have the powder, the other worshipers come to me.
They beg my blessing, willing to do whatever penance
I might set for them, so that they might receive the holy sacrament.
Women give me their bodies in whatever way
I demand.
They would give me their first born, if I required it. When
I have the powder,
I have the power of a god;
I can command anything, and my will, will be done. The followers of
my god are faithful, faithful unto death.
No other religion demands, or receives, such devotion.

I watch as the sterile water snakes its way up through the golden liquid in the hard,
hollow, plastic tube of the syringe.
I love to watch it rise slowly up through the yellowish oil:
oil transmuted from white powder, a transfiguration of the mundane into the ecstatic.
I take the needle, and gently, slowly, slide it into the vein.
I pull back on the plunger.
I see the blood spurt up into the pale yellow oil.
I pull the bandanna with my teeth, releasing the pent-up pressure from my heart.
I push the plunger down, discharging the yellowish liquid into the red pulsing blood of my vein.
For a brief and fleeting moment, as ether-vapor hits the back of my throat, as a surging wave rolls through my skull,
I come face to face with my god. We are joined in an ecstatic melding. Then,
I fall into the depressive after-glow of the union, already anticipating the next time.


–Erthona

Wow, you had me worried there for a minute, thought I'd caused you to turn to drugs. First time I remember ever inspiring a poem. Even if was one about drugs. Well I have seen my name in a couple of porta jons, other than the spellin ,it was pretty good shit. Like, " IF i HAD a LOW iq I could BE a THOUGHTjotTER too"
Later'
R.T.