alcohol

I Never Considered My Grandparents

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

Whom I never met, would be buried in Akron,
the backdrop of sleepless drunk nights, wandering
park properties as if I owned them in my boisterous
consumption, alive but for the thrill of spending
time with those I wish eternity upon, gathered
before me the gargoyles, the hellraisers, the love
I could burrow underneath rain-pocked heartache,
one golden anniversary away from immortality
on a slab of stone drunk kids can stumble over
and plant their knees in the recycled mud.

(originally published in Impspired, Summer 2023)

It’s Complicated

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

Sure, I know the DJ at Belvedere’s tonight
but that is all I have. My body is an ocean
liner that imagined a destination when
departing, but lost its way mid-voyage
while passengers scream it’s okay!
It’s okay!
                  On simple days
I open the window and watch
clouds pass with my long-hair
cat, breathing in the breeze like
we’ve both never been outside
before, trying to find some
comfortable place to rest
with the rail jutting up,
a dull blade.

(originally published in Ink Sac, Summer 2023)

This American Factory

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

Work snips years
it abducts me
from living

and the drinks are heavy
after
in my liver

my tenuous body
if I could live
in a less-consumed way

outside
with the grass
not overgrowing

my head
in the mountains
with a beach-blue

overlook
and while I’m
fantasizing

I want a bug force
field to keep
the pests away

I want to glide
over the landscape
a less-ambitious Magneto

breathing in
high-altitude sea breeze
until the stress is gone

and I deflate
into the ocean
though I don’t know

how to swim
see
even my daydreams

end with darkness

(originally published in The Wise Owl, Spring 2023)

Hamburglar

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

I’d do anything
for a cheeseburger
after a hangover

rob a bank of beef patties
to settle my beer belly

drive through suburbs
shooting holes
in the ozone

fingerguns pointed
in the ubiquitous direction
of hunger

my consumption
would satiate a hamlet

I drink
each excess
down

as Ronald
desires me to do

did you see the videos

pink slime resurrected
as hamburger Lazarus

but if I won the jackpot
I know a Big Mac
would be my first meal

golden arches
a chorus of mmms
echoing through cortex

processed organs
replacing orgasms

is that on the dollar menu

(originally published in HAD, Summer 2022)

Rabbit

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

Went to Thursdays with
a friend who quit boot
camp but hates this bar so
left. I am good at waiting in
darkness, alone, drinking.
Other friends come but are
clung on by creepers. I Woke
Up Today by Port O’Brien
plays and suddenly we’re on
the precipice of another Ohio
summer! I high-five Rabbit
AKA High-Five Guy who is
an Eagle Scout. He buys us
shots of Crown and Coke,
then throws his glass into
the air, aiming for the roof.
But there is a hole in the roof
and the glass follow’s gravity’s
stringent rules and shatters
on the kaleidoscope everywhere.
The bald, black-eyed bouncer
points a finger and we are back
on the streets, the future still
shards in our powerful palms.

(originally published in The Beatnik Cowboy, Spring 2023)

Two Best Friends

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

I skip pebbles in milk
while Colorado calls

my name an open field
prayer hands clasped

with two best friends
I have not seen

in years pass clouds
over the Rockies and I

am drunk staring at
my past blue yearning

the rain-drenched range
I write and ring cells

still new cities call
my name with headphones

on I play The Last of Us
in dark glow hands reach

for two best friends I sit
in silence happily

(originally published in Pennsylvania Bards Western PA Poetry Review, Spring 2023)

Cover

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

Skinny Love isn’t your strongest (red
guitar grass blades, guzzles of beer)

the world doesn’t know your name
still I walk infinity eights through

your friend’s backyard evading dormant
dog droppings while the strumming lands

soft & sweet, butterflies on my cheek.
I’ll find a blanket somewhere to sit on

under the awning, a shade for when it rains

(originally published in Ink Pantry, Winter 2022)

A Cockatrice Couple

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

Watching cardinals by the window, I expect them
to drop dead. But they never. Instead, we keep drinking

bird-themed beers and fly in orbit around each other’s
other lovers, because when we are drunk we call ourselves

a cockatrice couple, the way we span to such great lengths
to say, we’re blooming, there’s nothing wrong, we bloom.

Always, we come down to earth and say we can’t, never
could. When we land in water, our human qualities

return. Can’t withstand
the current.

(originally published in *82 Review, Fall 2022)

Cheap Cider

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

An apple a day keeps the doctor at bay–
OK. OK. This is becoming a problem.
I consume my only fruits on
an ABV chart and my whole life
is a waiting room, waiting waiting

waiting for the bad to come of this but
no DUI for me, I drink cheap ciders
and call for Ubers. Recently
a roommate said a keg he bought
was in his budget. I got a ledger
myself, lists of places my friends
go when they want to get wasted

so I budget my time for that despite
the knowing knowing knowing
to keep this up means I’ll
need to budget the liver.

(originally published in Academy of the Heart and Mind, Fall 2020)