Bloodline Whiskey

I once set out to discover myself,

to see how I had been distilled, and

Why I taste the way I do

I found at my core

grains of golden sorrow,

tears flowing like water,

fermented yeasty yearning,

for numbness

from deep notes of complex emotions,

that grow in the soul

like sweetest saprophyte.

I sifted through the years,

and strained out my darkened thoughts,

my coppery blood

collected into familiar bottles,

like Jack Daniels or Crown,

until the intoxicating aroma of family habits

co-opted my sensibilities.

And over time it was harder to tell

what emotions were unique to me,

or what had been passed down the family line,

however diluted, and bottled up

Disguised in the familial liquors of my spirit,

Things that were never supposed to be mine.