The Fourth Step

When the boy from all of the old poems Sends you a letter saying, “I’ve been clean for six months now, And it’s time to apologise for what my hands did back then,” Strangely, It will not feel like healing, Even if it is true, Even if this letter is the kindest thing this boy has done for you in years, For who among us knows how to swallow such a truth? To know for certain how many things we hoped were honesty Were in fact just whiskey, That every song we danced to that night Were sung by the Hallelujah Junkie Choir. This boy, who always woke up smiling, Showed up at your door with three tomatoes and a mango, Reached those dirty hands into such dark things. How humiliating, And what does it say about you that everything you still call love, He now calls rock bottom? When the boy from all of the old poems sends you a letter saying, “I’m so proud of you, And all the ways you have not died In the years that grew between us,” You will write back, “I’m so proud of you too. Look how clean we have become in the hands of other people. How lucky we are, to have realised love need look nothing like a shot glass, Or a shotgun. - Clementine von Radics