It’s not until you wake up on the floor,

nose bleeding and the hard-hitting sober headache,

not caused by where you landed, the skull too hard

to damage the wooden flooring

to any great extent,

but from the lack of

 

your

 

own

 

blood

 

pulsing,

 

writhing and wriggling

slowly through the veins and capillaries,

slowly, the snail’s trail dripping, slowly

to get to the head, to keep imagery alive

and to not look drunk,

a naked Lear and his fool

screaming at the moon’s

reflection on the blasted floorboards;

It’s not until then that you realise

that being bottom and out of control

is all you might ever be.

 

Ian D. Hall 2015