The Hard Way

It is one of my more depraved reality poems. I just find too many drug poems that are just full of euphemisms and don't try to describe the real gritty downside. I hope it doesn't offend the readers who tend to like more of my sensitive stuff, but some reality is just too powerful not to be expressed. Therefore I labeled it as extreme content. No profanity, just hard reality.

The offended ones would be the ones who cant face this hard reality. This was beautiful!
Its scary how many times I've visualized such a life before lol, and here you pen it like art.

most X'lent mrB.....most
po'try bout addiction around here is pretty self-pitifully indulgent.....i'm 1/4century past my active participation, spent 10yrs in the blessed 'recovery business' & deep into my sobriety, the sickness brought horrible pain & loss to my doorstep via self-destruction of several "healers", one of whom was a deep inti'mate of mine.

you know the flavor, the scent, the wrench'edness of it wit'out th'friggin whine

Thanks Daniel
 
Yes I still know the taste of it. The smell of it,even seven blocks away. It's been near 7 years, but days go by when I still smell in in frosting, furniture polish, etc. It is as vivid as the last day and just more & more craving that leads to one hit erases every intervening day and year. The next second it's like you smoked last 10 minutes ago.... and you're off to the races.
********************************************************
 
Thanks Dennis
 
 I'm starting to work on some confessional stuff, some grit (with a lesson) and assemble it from that decade that I spent in the grips of ill activities. It all happened, It all should be told. There are a couple lessons worked in and some poetic
styling. One or two more like this. There's no denying that I walked through every scene. I still smell and taste it every time I read this page.

Big Ups to ur realness in this piece I truly enjoyed it I have had loved oned addicted to crack and u descibed vividly what they would always try to explain. Well Done!

Thank you Firebyrd  
   
It is important to see the obsessive reality they sink to. The next day in their mind they can play the power games, the counting money they turned over, the people they worked, they people they roughed. But during the morning hours emptiness is the only emotion.  
   
It all starts as a few college/ HS kid just learning to snort and pop a few pills. Wake up! When you get truly serious, and you eventually will, It will even take a year after that when you start to think you might have some issues. Then the money starts getting shorter and circumstance finds you doing things you never imagined in your power. Then you have reached the where I chose to change. Any of you "not so bad yet" dabblers should read this. It ain't so glorious for very long, this drug path. "We hunger for oblivion, but only bite off bitter mouthfuls of greater suffering!"

Only way this can be understood is if experienced in some slight way, no doubt

Or for several years literally "the hard way" It was a he'll of a decade ( or so) and the wisdom it bought was worth nowhere near the price.

A haunting poem of something I have not and hope not to ever experience. A great insight though and I thank you for sharing this even though the price paid for this is never equal.

very well written. its so sad how u spend hours searching the floor and smoking dry wall and stale popcorn...anything that even remotely resembles rock. i spend over 12yrs battling heroin and crack, with only a few months clean. i feel your pain and it gives me hope to know you have a decade clean and scares the hell out of me at the same time to know that the memories of the "taste" are still so vivid in your mind. you should check out "forever untold", its a very vivid poem like yours describing the fucked cycle of heroin addiction. different demon but i still think you can relate to the pain i tried to express  

Hard reality is right.

"and we wait wordless" really hit for me.

Thanks Grimace.

Thanks Dave. Nice poem. Yeah the taste still haunts me both of the real stuff and the second terrible taste of smoking carpet garbage, using your lungs like an exploratory probe.

Thank you dichotomy. Obviously you recognize those hours between the final run and sunrise, during which the body fails to give up on it's pursuit, but the mind knows it's a false dream. Hours standing with people you hate, refusing to leave. Crack I saw as the most poetic of drugs because it lacked the inspiration and delusion of the warm and fuzzy dope. It forces even morons to become existential philosophers.

so much of what i would want to say about this has been stated. but i would like to further convey that this is a harsh reality- but further more in that moment of using, does not seem harsh, everything having already been sold is not that harsh to an active user, its just a truth...the last stanza that starts "crack is a poem.."sounds great and bodes well within this structure, but im also curious what the poem would be like without the word crack. in the first stanza  particularly the sights spoken of are oh so clearly that of a crackhead- but one that has not been there, might not necessarily recognize that, but still be enticed by the craft of the write....sidenote: the only thing thats cornier than a poem about drugs that go to either extreme(glorifying or condemning and not noting the complexities) is someone who writes from the grounds of inexperience.im sure you've read a poem by someone describing addiction and within two lines you can tell they have never used..not the case here

Thank you man. Kind words. I did a crack poem a while back without crack in it, "Haiku" and nobody really seemed to understand it, or if they did, nobody let on. This one really seemed to ring some bells for people (another bad inside pun for any former users who read this) so I felt it was best to be explicit at some point. I assembled it out of two smaller poems I had on my site. I took the strong beginning of one and put it with the strong ending of the other. Now if an innocent comes across it, I do leave them in mystery for a part of the poem, but I think it's short enough that the word "crack" answers their questions soon, and I can then explain my purpose before they stop reading. I know exactly what you mean about the armchair writers and their belief that their social concern qualifies them to write as-if. Knowing chuckle. I think I have seen a few.

You r a deep individual and intelligent. Every poem ive read of yours has been well thought out and written. I simply Love your style;)

Aw LL you are going to make me blush. Thank you. It means much from you. Thanks again for your support.

I dedicate this to my first love, A 37-year old man I met downtown when I was a 22-year old runaway. He and the streets taught me alot of things. I'm 26 now, and my life has been so changed since I first met him.

Yes it is never that someone relates to this a little bit. Either they have never been there or they know every single word of this was drawn from countless sunrises and repetition. It wasn't just my experience, or yours, but uncounted masses now spawning generations have to say: "This, exactly this was my life. How did he know?"

Offend are you kidding me this is great.. It's raw

thanks Christian. No pun intended but it was kind of funny.

Your "depraved reality poems" are stirring and vivid.

I thought your website was cool too. I'll certainly be reading more of your work.

Hey thanks man... for the read, for the compliment, and for reminding me that website is still there. Eeek I'd better update that soon. All of those poems are a couple of years old.