Some old writing

Some old writing

Some old writing that I just

brought up from a bin in the basement

reminded me of the time

when I lit a piece of paper

that I was typing on on fire

and watched the flames leap

up the curtain  in front of me.

I sat there in a catatonic state,

a zombie to the whole situation.

After she put out the fire,

my girlfriend didn’t know what

to do with me. She made a bunch

of phone calls and they said

take him to the mental institution.

It was about five days before

I figured out who I was

and who everybody else was

like The President, who the folks

at the loony bin seemed to think

it was important for me to know.

This was in the mid-eighties when

I was doing a fair amount of LSD

and drinking copious amounts of liquor

The doors of perception that

60’s gurus predicted would open

for me if I did hallucinogens

had quite the opposite effect on me.