Sunday Morning Bourbon In Bed Poem by Todd Garland

Beneath a hill top aerie—a paradise
of bachelors bound in a nut shell—
Hall Boulevard begins its morning stir.
Cars hiss and swash the wet black
streets as the first of the faithful crawl
to a communion of sacred wine….
(Or are these hissings the last of Saturday’s
satyrs—a Silenus… say, … or a band of maenads,
belatedly straggling home from their own orgy
of wine loving oneness… from their rites Dionysian?)
But it is something before seven a.m.,
and I would rather drink alone—
pondering potions of blood and bread—
I will take my Sunday morning bourbon in bed.

A coffee pot is percolating in the kitchen. I sit up,
and from my bedside survey the detritus of nights
indulgence—an ash tray bristling Camel butts, souring
beer glasses, a night-table grimed with sandy mix
of ashes and ale. Concrete hues from an enveloping
blanket of drizzle show their wonted morning pallor
through my bedroom window—gray lights accenting
lumps on the floor—yesterdays change of clothes,
and over there—a book bag—trophies from a Saturday
prowl of Portland bookshops: —Junger’s “Storm
of Steel”, Nietzsche’s “Genealogy of Morals”, et cetera.
A revaluation of all values on a Sabbath morn, as cars
below hiss to a covenant of other rites, of books unread—
I will take my Sunday morning bourbon in bed.

Urged by the coffees redolent musk, I return
an ample mug to my bed-table. Topping off
the Columbian ground with a truly sublime epitome
of Kentucky corn, I breathe its balmy vapors—
and as my tongue sups ambrosial heat warm,
ethereal spirits ascend teeming the galleries and
grottoes of mind with Boschian enchantment.
I spark a smoke, my censer, and turn on some tunes.
And against the damp chill of winter’s
morn I listen to Jerry’s guitar bleed eucharistic
drops of sunshine, recalling the canticles
and libation pourers of other ages, and of other
worlds. It is seven a.m.—time for “Dawn of the Dead”.
I take my Sunday morning bourbon in bed.