Life Blood

The blonde girl sits at the bar sipping cranberry juice and vodka through a clear plastic straw.

As it hits her ruby red lipstick it looks like watered down blood.

Alcohol is her lifeblood.

It makes her heart beat.

Her heart is a ticking time bomb.

She has chipping dark purple nail polish on her fingernails.

She holds a cigarette at a slight angle between her pointer and middle finger.

Ashes scatter onto the black countertop near a clear square glass ashtray with a chip on the side of it.

There are rings on the counter for drinks sat there before she arrived.

The bartender does not notice due to limited lighting in the room.

The bar is quiet tonight and absent of its usual patrons.

Only a few lone soldiers sit at the end of the bar and another girl with long black hair sits at a corner table writing poetry on napkins.

The blonde girl takes another drink from her lipstick stained straw.

She pokes at the ice cubes in her glass like miniature icebergs.

The ice cubes sink into her glass and then rise again to the surface.

Next, she swirls her pinky finger around in the glass, removes it gently and wipes it on the small square bar napkin in front of her.

The bar is quiet tonight.

She listens to “Every Rose Has It’s Thorn” by Poison on the jukebox.

Time is passing slowly.

Slower than it usually does.

Alcohol is her lifeblood.

Her heart is a ticking time bomb.

It is ready to explode at any given moment.

This is the way most of her nights start off.

Fast forward two hours and the music will be too loud and she won’t be able to make out anyone’s words.

She nods her head like she understands.

But she cannot hear anything,

And is bad at reading lips.

The bar noise is loud.

It sounds like thirty people are talking at the same time and the jukebox is playing over all the conversations.

She hears cheers from the crowd.

Her drink magically fills itself four times without her realizing it.

Her hands go numb and her judgment becomes clouded.

She finds comfort in the crowd of blurry images and names she can’t quite make out.

The ice cubes in her glass are long melted.

And the girl who was writing on napkins left hours ago.

Leaving a single strain of her long black hair behind, like a window to the future that the blonde girl will not see until later.

Then the lights come on for the last call.

Bar time is fifteen minutes sooner than real time, but it will take her years to realize this.

This poem is featured in the poetry collection Passing Skeletons.

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