This was written as I reflected on the effects of parental alcoholism, and by extension drug addiction in general, on young children, especially infants and toddlers. I was one such infant and toddler, so I have some insight into these effects.
Reft
An amber liquid sapped her attention away,
And from her heart stripped loving intention away.
The lonesome wail of hunger competing in vain
Unleashed her rage and tore her abstention away.
It wasn’t desire denied with an angry glare,
But painful dearth closed up in detention away.
An oscillation between assurance and terror
Caused a distress that rent apprehension away.
Angels swept this fragmenting soul to safety
To lands where shadows shift a dimension away.
Smothered beneath resentment, bitter and fierce,
Any potential was locked from ascension away.
Wound in the Catherine wheel of her deception,
Spirit was ripped in morbid extension away.
Remove from your heart the demon’s claw, Zahhar,
Let pass the touch of its dark invention away.
This is my 69th ghazal.
