rare intervals of sobriety

Juan Miguel Torres

rows of semi-human statues
sour with the smell of urine
saturated with cheap fermented grapes
styled in third- hand clothes
depress the row houses
the once lovely mansions
the 1880’s mansions
which are now decaying dwellings
whose windows are filled with signs
which call them hotels
but whose transients choose to name flat houses

smog
paper- littered streets
dark and narrow alleys
whose walls are decorated with fuck yous
and other frustrating portrayals
all combine
intermingle
collide
to add to the already stagnant atmosphere
where today and tomorrow
have as much difference to its inhabitants
as does a second to a year

shoes come from a forgotten past
they persist to be shoes only because
of the many strings
cords
and some ropes
that hold them together
shoes
they’re used
not to keep away the cold or heat
or the hardness of the streets
for
when was the last time such a thing as feeling been felt
shoes
they are used to protect the skin and the bone
not from heat or cold
but from tearing
cutting
or worse
breaking
and at rare times they are useful
in case a brief sober moment arrives
and with it
feeling

life
it has meaning only when there is a start
a middle
an end
but what if life happens to be an eternal
nebulous middle
a middle whose days and weeks are not separated by time
but by the pints and quarts at hand
a middle where the end of one year
and the start of another
is nothing more
than rare intervals of sobriety