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Poetry #518
(published December 23, 2010)
Holiday Poem
by Morgan Atwood
I remember from youth the old men
gathered behind the Walgreens
in the Sunday morning cold
Passing the bottles of Scope
their beards greased with slobber
and green frost
I can see them from the parking lot edge
as we sit, warm in the pickup
waiting for the pills to be bottled
The last Christmas of youth is behind me
somewhere at the hospital

It's December again, and I wonder at the freedom
lined up along the back pharmacy wall
The late stagers shaking as they pass the real bottle now
They got the blessing of Sunday sales
a gift that came between my youth and adulthood
and real whiskey don't freeze in your beard
Warm indoors and with the tyranny of family
I'm twelve years old again wondering without judgment
at the freedom of drinking in the wind


Morgan Atwood writes from the remote back-country of New Mexico.

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