Barrel-Spun Confession

It was never about the bourbon exactly,

though the char on the rim called to something scorched in me,

something already burned down and begging to be tasted again,

just one more sip from that smoky gospel,

sung straight from an oak belly that never judged me for coming back.

They say alcoholic like it’s a joke,

like it’s some excuse to toast what almost ruined me,

but Jack Daniels and I, we knew different,

he was a velvet-tongued preacher with a bottle for a pulpit

and I drank down his sermons like holy fire

because no one tells you how much easier it is

to forget your own name when it’s written on the bottom of a glass.

I didn’t drink for courage, I drank for silence,

the kind that curls warm in your ribs and makes you think you’re still whole,

even when you’re leaking through the seams of your skin.

It tasted like home and hate and heat and hunger,

and I loved it more than I ever should have admitted,

until the barrel went dry

and I had to find other ways to stay upright.

But even now,

when someone says oak or char or sip

I taste the wanting again.