I am addicted
But oddly
I guess owing to the laws governing the drinking age
I became a regular user of marijuana
Available only sub rosa
Before a regular user of alcohol
Publicly traded
I spent the night at a classmate’s house
Once in the tenth grade
And we dipped into the parental cabinet
My first experience of real intoxication
After a few tipsies sacrilegious in the sacristy
But
That summer I started playing
The youngest in a fine band of twelfth-grade rockers
I had a Wurlitzer electric piano
And rode as a passenger in the GTO
Hauling a trailer emblazoned with the legend
The New Calibre Jacksonville Fla
Joints in the back seat and Santana on the 8-track
The enlisted men’s club at Glynco
With bikinied girls in go-go cages
The sorority party at the Hilton
On the beach in Clearwater
I totally peaked in high school
Spent a fumigant year in college
Dropped out
And really learned how to drink
When I got a house gig in ‘75
The rockingest Holiday Inn in America
I had beer on the way there
Beer on the way home
Beer on stage beer on the break
And beer to send me off to sleep
Marijauna all day long
And in really fat times a line or two
To keep me up all the damned night
I hit the road and later
When kids came got off the road for a day gig
Went back to school and drank
Before during and after everything
Had the best rock band in Tallahassee
Midnight to four Friday Saturday and Sunday
Read Shakespeare aced chemistry
Fell in love with the British Romantics
Beery early morning chats
And a wretched hangover on the sabbath