Promises are made to be broken By Dennis Moriarty

It’s a struggle but finally you are wake

With a head full

Of unconquerable mountains and penny

Weary eyes.

Sitting up you blink away the coinage

Of death, 

Eyes opened fully, you take in the carnage

Of the night before.

You pick your way through the fallout, 

Among discarded clothes

And fragments of the night that you can’t

Quite remember.

Downstairs the house is cold and grey as

The ash from last nights fire,

The air thick as your tongue, smelling of stale

Beer and sour whiskey.

In the kitchen you play a game of hunt the

Coffee beans,

Find them in a packet already open and like you,

Already past it’s sell by date.

You grind and brew arabica beans roasted, like

Your thoughts, to the edge of darkness.

Exchanging one addiction for another, you slurp

And swallow,

Hoping the bitter taste will take the edge off

The craving for another night before.

You sit alone drinking and listening to the rain 

Chuckling in the downpipes,

Promising yourself you will not drink before 

Mid day, will not pass out

Before god knows when. But between sips of

coffee and the laughing rain,

You resign yourself to another day of what

Might have been,

After all, promises are made to be broken.

Dennis Moriarty was born in London, England and now lives in Wales. Married with five grown up offspring Dennis likes walking the dog in the mountains, reading and writing.

In 2017 he won the Blackwater poetry competition and went to county Cork in Ireland to read his work at the international poetry festival. Dennis has had poems featured in many publications including Blue nib, Our poetry archive, Setu bilingual, The passage between and others.