Heirloom

After your death

I'm rummaging through the drawers

for your bottle of Vicodin

hoping your ghost

isn't watching.

Why can I never stay clean?

Is it because I'm weak?

I see myself like your husband

in 20 years

a tired young drunk

sick of feeling old,

who died before his grandchildren

were even born.

I hear footsteps in the kitchen

and wonder if it's you

hiding them from me —

but I hear lots of things

when the floor beneath me

crumbles

and I'm left dangling

from my barbed sanity

with bloody hands.

I swore I'd keep it locked away,

this heirloom of addiction,

but right now I need to hold it

and feel it

because I miss you

and I'm not strong enough to accept the fact

that you're gone

just yet.

So far this is the only moment

I've told myself you're not here,

when I find and swallow the last

three pills

that couldn't stop your pain,

then wash them down with gin

that wasn't enough

to stop mine.