A Tribute to Creating
I started drinking at age twelve
Thirteen brought cigarettes
By fourteen I was smoking pot
And popping pills came next.
Then came shrooms and acid
Though I not know not which nor when
By eighteen coke had tickled my nose
And ol’ Molly was my friend.
But of all the highs I ever did find
In my insatiable quest
The rush I felt when cutting myself
I always considered best.
And I could not find a reason to change
As I managed to find success.
Amidst the haze of crazy and strange
I finished the top of my class.
At the peak of my addiction
I stumbled to the next phase of school
Who would of known a drug addict
Could get his college paid in full?
Eager for a challenge,
I took on math and statistics
But when I found this too dull too,
I began to go ballistic
I started selling cid'
But swallowed most my tabs
I drank daily and snorted lady
But still made it to my labs.
Somehow I made the Dean's list
But was too high to express surprise
Straight As couldn't elicit feelings
Like razors across my thighs.
I convinced myself that life was pointless
And that I was wasting space
As far too many others have felt
While standing in my place.
But something changed before I could leave—
Almost everything, in fact—
The high I'd been searching for all along
Helped to keep my life intact:
Composing poems helped me see the light;
My fingers breathed creation.
The power of composing verse—
Drugs pale to this sensation!
So I wrote about addiction.
I wrote about self-abuse.
I wrote about depression.
I wrote about suicide, too.
And even if the progress was slow
The bottle gave way to prose
The pills I realized had to go
And I finally cleaned my nose.
I am a creator! And so instead of my skin
My addiction now is carving
Onto pages with a pen.