Drink Poem by Mark E Webster

Drink

Sometimes I like a drink.
I take a sip or two,
or maybe a gulp.
Like you?
Yes, sometimes I gulp,
when I'm really thirsty,
On a very hot day.
But not before twelve thirty
or maybe eleven or ten
depending on the way I feel, like if I'm happy then I'll take a swig. No mystery, I'm bigging up the emotion. Or if I'm feeling blue,
I'll have a glug, or three.
Allow the soothing balm of libation to get me out of a stew.
Or, if I don't feel a thing,
I'll maybe have a snifter, or four,
to oil the synapses and grease the ligaments so that I might sing
and dance myself real.
In between the highs and the lows and the plateaus I might have a slurp, or five, well I'm only being sociable, and never when I drive.
I'm wholly responsible.
But sometimes there really is cause to have a good long draught or six, to bring a smile or even a laugh to my forlorn visage, quick.
And when bad news strikes me down, I get in the car, no, no I walk into town and heartily neck a bottle, or seven, to soften the blow,
for a while, until the pain is numbed and I've succumbed to the anaesthesia which follows.
But it does no good to wallow,
hair of the dog required.
I'll have a shot, or eight, restore the equilibrium and, to keep it going, I'll pop a jeroboam, or nine, to keep me feeling fine and dandy, and a hip flask or ten, is handy to build a cosy wall around me.
Fortification against the chill.
They say alcoholism is a sickness.
Well I'm not ill, as long as I've got a pub, or eleven, to frequent on my journey to drinking heaven.
We're living in a toping nation
Where all are grinning through a fug of lies and exaggeration.
We all like a glass, or twelve, but never by ourselves, apart from in-between our heady social scene. And just before I hit the sack, I like to knock back a dram, or thirteen,
to get me beyond the brink of sleep where I dream deep - of drink.
Like I say, sometimes I like a drink.