By Misti Velvet Rainwater
Date: 23 October 1999

Away From the Edge

   another dry night
   in this dry county
   no tears
   [no shit!]
   no beer
   no you
   I'm surviving, somehow
   I have forsaken
   style
   for sanity
   before
   in the glittery, godless
   days of yore
   I would have bothered
   you some more
   with acerbic
   e-mail messages
   or some sophomoric
   form of revenge
   [ordering crap outta magazines]
   [in your name]
   I would have
   drank and smoked
   cheap cigarettes
   hurried to the nearest bar
   and latched onto
   a tolerable replacement
   I would have bleached
   my hair
   disconnected my phone
   sat on the floor
   in the dark
   listening to "The End"
   80 times
   in a row

       but I am being good
            to myself
       for a change
       I don't have a damn thing
       to prove
       to my invisible audience
       of misguided demons
           [they're pathetic, the lot of 'em]
           [and losing]
           [their edge]