Recovery
What starts as harmless cover crops / rye grass, barley, winter wheat / converges into cash crops /
converts field grain to mash / sobriety to sky-climbing whiskey highs / until the comedown / the
crash to rough sand and silt / next to a lake lapping like continuous pours / a siren, desire one
cannot slake or shake / everything a metaphor for liquor’s bourbon burn / barrel smoke smells /
push through the fever sweats / shiver in withdrawal’s blanket / here nothing is ever neat / just
witness to old-fashioned emptiness
Thad DeVassie is the author of This Side of Utopia (forthcoming; Cervena Barva Press). His work has appeared in numerous journals including New York Quarterly, Poetry East, West Branch, NANO Fiction, Juked, Collateral, Unbroken, PANK, and Lunate. He is a lifelong Ohioan who writes from the outskirts of Columbus.
Emerge Literary Journal 