After the Wedding

I stood up against the hard Missouri morning
Decked in sober light,  
the river slow as the sludge  
my heart pumped,
Begging for water and relief
And though I drank and drank  
As I had the night before
The pains would not abate.
The night of revelry gave way to a dirge at dawn
The morning was unmitigated
 
So often we drink to something we’ve mistaken,
An idol in a familiar mask who
In cocky revelry, recieving your supplication
Peels off the cover, exposing its true self
A stranger, a villain, a fiend  
getting away with a piece of you.
Buyer’s remorse of the soul.
 
Lying on the floor of St Louis airport,
I dreamt a trickster god standing over me,
A great green grin stretching behind his head
My liver cradled in his hands.
His mouth said thank you, eyes darting.
I did not feel close to him at all.
I do not think that I will follow him into the underworld.
I am always turning around to look behind me
 
At myself, disheveled beside the panting lady, white strewn
Covering the floor in a spotted silence,
A secret hiding for spring time beneath the patchwork snow
Omission of the consciousness, bits and phrases
Love half remembered and half dreamt,  
Stalking my corners,  
creaks and moans
A subtle evidence I will not acknowledge
But cannot look away from.
 
Pain in my abdomen where my liver used to be  
I am awake
Standing, my neck whiplash-sore, I strain to see
A trail of blood leading away to the trickster god’s lair,
Beckoning, an invitation.
 
I turn around and board the plane instead.