heliocentrism
Isa Cayetano
all coke gave me was a hangover. i prefer dissociatives to stimulants. but i imagine for most, the latter’s effect is akin to that of your gaze on my tangled, spark-burnt circuiting. though likening you to cocaine isn’t right—it doesn't do you justice.
seven or so years ago they started cutting all the heroin with fentanyl; so, if you were addicted to heroin then you were addicted to fentanyl. you can’t find pure heroin anymore. not down here. i learned this from a man in miami’s seltzer water prison--adorned in robes of paper; wrist, like mine, hidden under a white plastic branding. a birthdate and a barcode. his admission date read weeks before my own.
“if you ever want to detox,” he told me “you gotta check into the hospital. they gotta monitor you. the withdrawals, they’re so painful, they could kill you.”
do you remember i called you every other day that week from the cord phone on the wall? fuck me for breaking my detox—i could’ve spared myself but i didn’t care to and neither did you.
from the crisis center waiting room, another man had reminisced on the bag of sunshine (his words, not mine). “heaven on the way in. hell on the way out.” it occurred to me that maybe it’d be a worthy foe for you. the only one.
i’ve never done heroin--nobody ever offered me any. but i’ve known you. and nothing so far helps me forget.
do you remember telling me i deserve everything good in the world? how foolish of me to think that included you. how devastating that your disbelief in your own goodness led it right to the grave beside my own (please tell me it wasn’t you who put the shovel in my hand while i slept). what’s that saying? fool me once shame on you, fool me twice…but i’ve never denied the title of fool: i wear my shame with my jester’s hat, dancing a tightrope for your entertainment. i lived for your entertainment. you let me live for you.
keep taking your pleasures. you know they’ll be cut with pain. quit pretending you don’t welcome it. there’s no such thing as pure heroin anymore.
seven or so years ago they started cutting all the heroin with fentanyl; so, if you were addicted to heroin then you were addicted to fentanyl. you can’t find pure heroin anymore. not down here. i learned this from a man in miami’s seltzer water prison--adorned in robes of paper; wrist, like mine, hidden under a white plastic branding. a birthdate and a barcode. his admission date read weeks before my own.
“if you ever want to detox,” he told me “you gotta check into the hospital. they gotta monitor you. the withdrawals, they’re so painful, they could kill you.”
do you remember i called you every other day that week from the cord phone on the wall? fuck me for breaking my detox—i could’ve spared myself but i didn’t care to and neither did you.
from the crisis center waiting room, another man had reminisced on the bag of sunshine (his words, not mine). “heaven on the way in. hell on the way out.” it occurred to me that maybe it’d be a worthy foe for you. the only one.
i’ve never done heroin--nobody ever offered me any. but i’ve known you. and nothing so far helps me forget.
do you remember telling me i deserve everything good in the world? how foolish of me to think that included you. how devastating that your disbelief in your own goodness led it right to the grave beside my own (please tell me it wasn’t you who put the shovel in my hand while i slept). what’s that saying? fool me once shame on you, fool me twice…but i’ve never denied the title of fool: i wear my shame with my jester’s hat, dancing a tightrope for your entertainment. i lived for your entertainment. you let me live for you.
keep taking your pleasures. you know they’ll be cut with pain. quit pretending you don’t welcome it. there’s no such thing as pure heroin anymore.