Best Healthday Poems
By the time I was a score and four
I was retired from overseas duty.
Was husband to an American beauty.
Had smoked at least ten years or more.
I was hep...... Cool Hand Luke the fool.
John Wayne, all my idols puffed weed.
The movies, sports, all planted the seed.
Be a cat, a lover, all the things so cool.
Smoke, you fool, that’s the golden rule.
Oh, I quit a thousand times. Not really.
But it went from the sublime to silly.
What I needed was a quitting tool.
Nothing came out for years, but proof.
If you smoked you would die early.
It would put you in the grave girlie.
They convinced me it was no spoof.
Then about ‘80 came the gum to chew.
Nicotine substitute with a doctor’s care.
Even so, you had to first declare
Ernest intention, a desire to be through.
I bought mine in May of eighty four.
Made up my mind I would like to quit.
The first few days, I was a nervous twit.
I thought “Lord help me, Please, no more”
The secret for me, beyond the Nicorette,
beyond God’s help, and the family grim.
After thirty seconds the want was slim
and I had gotten by with no cigarette.
Enduring thirty seconds at each twinge,
minute by minute, day by day until
my body expunged, the habit was nil.
There was no need to think of a binge.
After a while there was no more want.
Time passed, now nearly thirty years.
My lungs are clean, eased are the fears
wife and children had, their faith I flaunt.
© Jul 14 2010 For Dane Ann’s “being trapped” contest
Sitting next to insanity,
Shivers run the length of my
spine
Nothing will be remembered...
And sound is forever strange.
Hyperactive disorder,
Just one more day might do
But still walking in place,
My eyes shine forever with fear
I lay my head down,
A stomach full of aching hurt
Rest here and try to think
The horrors of yesterday
return.
A darkest, deepest hole,
One which sits on my body
Is for one day filled up
With sacrifice for fleeting joy.
FLU - DAY 1
Just when it came to me I cannot say
nor did I think that something was amiss
as rising from a restless sleep one day
but won't admit it coming from a kiss;
I pulled my covers quick to hide my head
ignoring ev'ry call to rise and shine
light headed when I rise out of my bed
I stumble into life that I call mine;
and aching ev'rywhere an ache can be
I try to face the day as best I can
til all the grit I have gives out on me
and my defenses quick get overran.
and as the daylight ends, I hide away
between the covers where I want to stay.
Lines for a Female Psychiatrist
Perhaps when I’m better I’ll discover
you aren’t married, after all,
and I should be better by Spring.
On that day I’ll walk
down Michigan Avenue
and up again along the Lake,
my back to the wind, facing you,
my black raincoat buttoned to the neck,
my collar a castle wall
around my crew cut growing in.
Do you remember the first hour?
I sat there unshaven,
a Martian drummed from his planet,
ordered never to return.
With your legs crossed,
you smoked the longest cigarette
and blinked like a child when I said,
“I’m distracted by your knee.”
The first six months you smoked
four cigarettes a session
as I prayed out my litany of escapades,
each detail etched perfectly in place.
The day we finally changed chairs
and I became the patient
and you the doctor,
you knew that I didn’t know
where I had been,
where I was then,
and even though my hair
had begun to grow in
how far I'd have to go
before I could begin.
Donal Mahoney
NO PROMISES NO LIES
Addicts run away from life each time they use.
They run further away from life only to wake up the next day feeling worse or the same.
You see all the addicts that I know are running away from something called pain.
Most of all themselves, they run from from something or to something.
Some place they will never find, it always seems to be one high or one day away.
Freedom is what they seek although when they use their drugs of choice, they
actually become enslaved.
Each day they become further away from reality and one step closer to going insane.
They don't miss it when they get clean.
Don't get me wrong they still have cravings but to stay clean they can not let the feelings of
loss or sickness get to far from their minds.
They have to keep one eye and ear open so that they don't relapse.
Easy no but worth every effort they put into it.
It's worth every bit of happiness they find.
No Promises No Lies...-An Addicts Friend-
My home isn’t like most,
There are no mirrors or black
On my floors or walls,
I know that people look at me and judge
But sometimes I'm not sure what it is all about.
I see my family and friends upset,
Every day a piece of me slips away.
Some days I get mad and go off.
I started hitting and kicking the other day
the shakes have stared to settle in and I'm unsteady on my feet.
My memory isn’t what it use to be
The pictures that cover the walls help me.
Never thought it would ever come down to wearing one of these.
Or being fed in bed, could this really be the end?
At least my journey was with the ones I loved while this disease decided to take me.