alcohol – Cajun Mutt Press

CMP Featured Writer: Joanna Grant

August 6, 2024 James D. Casey IV

Things I Googled After My Last Living Uncle Finally
Drank Himself to Death Just After Christmas

–Average regular funeral cost in this Year of Our Lord

–Cost of most basic cremation for people who can’t afford regular funeral

–Can I have my ashes scattered on Hank Williams, Senior’s grave

–Can I scatter them on Hank Williams’s grave legally

–If caught scattering my ashes on Hank Williams’s grave illegally what happens to

the person who scattered me hypothetically

–Penalty for stealing a corpse and setting it on fire outside Joshua Tree was

–Penalty for setting corpse on fire outside Joshua Tree is now

–Greatest hits (did you mean Gram not Graham Parsons—disambiguate)

–YouTube Flying Burrito Brothers videos (playlist approx. 1:43:36)

–How do you actually drink yourself to death and how long does it take (Mayo Clinic)

–YouTube: Best of Intervention Season 12 (playlist approx. 6:27)

–Alcoholism addiction causes (nature versus nurture current research)

–Addiction causes experts role of lack of connection complex childhood trauma

–Use of humor to deflect childhood trauma how bad is it really

–Alexa: how do I forget what I want to forget and remember what I need to remember

–No Alexa I said “remember” not “cucumber” not that kind of recipe

–Okay Siri then: to what extent am I my own person? How trapped am I in my past? How trapped am I in the things that happened sixty years ago, the night their mother slowly bled to death drunk on the floor, their father drunker next to her, her blood slowly rusting on his raw-knuckled hands? How to free myself of this mirage, this image concocted of vague description still clearer to my mind’s eye than anything I’ve ever actually seen in the flesh?

–Response: Your search did not match any documents please try different keywords/more keywords/fewer keywords/more general keywords/check your spelling/good luck/you are going to need it/Season’s Greetings and Merry Christmas to all those who celebrate/With the Warmest Wishes for the Happiest of New Years

Joanna Grant is a Cajun mutt, as her father was born on the Gulf Coast near New Orleans and her mother came from Georgia. She currently lives and works outside of Doha, Qatar, where she teaches college extension classes to deployed American soldiers. Her most recent collection is Adrift from Alien Buddha Press.

Cajun Mutt Press Featured Writer 05/31/24

May 31, 2024 James D. Casey IV

Sobering Up

a small wooden pub with a beer tap on every table;
four beers in, I was already feeling the effects.

I pictured Emily sitting across from me, instead of the friends
I’d gone out with for a couple of beers; how we’d have broken all
the pub’s records
(they had a screen on the wall, the all-time record was 35L
by a group who knows how large),
how we’d have loved the ability not to chase down
bartenders more willing to flirt (or drink themselves to a stupor)
than do their fucking job.

few beers in, and my liver began protesting; growing soft,
losing my former championship shape. am I still
a pro, as a few bartenders used to tell me?
do I still have it?

the answer’s probably no, it hurts.
no more chasing the perpetual drunk while able
to function amidst the cloud of inebriation.

I sit sober now, too, recalling the hangover mornings
of pro wrestling and vodka-and-orange juice,
barely able to breathe, let alone walk,

and yet, I’d always find myself back to the bars come afternoon.
I needed the drink; I still need it, I just don’t have it anymore.

speeding towards the age of 28, just a couple of months to join
the CLUB, despite my being no musician, nor exceptionally talented.

I smell bourbon; the bar across the street, a fancy establishment
for Lamborghini-driving motherfuckers, is about to open.

I should go talk to the bartender about the possibility of replacing him.
could I work in a bar, without drinking myself to oblivion every night?

once, I just drank bars dry. oh, the irony, having to be the sober
man serving drinks to carefree drunks and rich assholes.

the coffee’s strong, I’ve nothing to do but dream of other nights and days,
early afternoons of tequila, late nights of bourbon.

I might be going out tonight too, with friends once more. and after a few beers in,
I’ll be ready to be tucked in and soundly sleeping. no more
aimless wandering through the dark streets, drunk, ready to fuck and punch.

lighting a cigarette, in the blue smoke once more I see
Emily’s eyes. almost sense her lips on mine. tasting cheap bourbon
and even cheaper cocaine.

love, I failed you; doing the one thing I promised I’d never do
the night before we went to the abortion clinic and lost it all.
I’m growing up, getting old as fuck; paying the price
of years-long stupors and failed love affairs that’d never replace
what we had.

it’s alright; I’ll just drink my coffee for now, try to make it
in the sex-novel business. soon, and certainly long before I make it to 30,
I’ll either be next to you in the Devil-dealing poker table,
or, in a rundown strip joint, drinking pimps under the table
and comforting dancers that are just too sick of cheap assholes.

Currently residing in Greece, George Gad Economou has a Master’s degree in Philosophy of Science and is the author of Bourbon Bottles and Broken Beds (Adelaide Books), Of the Riverside (Anxiety Press) and Reeling Off the Barstool (Dumpster Fire Press). His words have also appeared, amongst other places, in Spillwords Press, Ariel Chart, Cajun Mutt Press, Fixator Press, Horror Sleaze Trash, Outcast Press, The Piker Press, The Beatnik Cowboy, The Rye Whiskey Review, and Modern Drunkard Magazine.

Cajun Mutt Press Featured Writer 05/20/24

May 20, 2024 James D. Casey IV

Parallel Lives

Every city has one, a block God
forgot, some unofficial war zone,
demilitarized, but, alive and active
with all the usual suspects cops roust
on periodic missions to clean up after
some particularly rowdy disturbance,
something so embarrassing, around
election day, even the mayor is moved
to act. After the votes have been counted,
results confirmed, the war goes on as before.
911 calls come in and cars are dispatched,
later rather than sooner, except, in cases
of extreme cruelty, events that make
front page news or, on occasion, CNN;
‘Fraternity hazing involved terrorist
techniques, pledges for unchartered
frat subjected to punishments, not unlike
water boarding, until they were forced
to beg for mercy.’
The cries from basement/ dungeon so loud,
so horrific, even cowed neighbors
could no longer endure the noise, could
only imagine what must be happening inside.
University officials assert they had
‘suspicions banned fraternity was still
accepting new members,’ as they had been,
banding and disbanding time and time
again, for fifty years, only the names
and faces changed.
Over time, the block is modified,
buildings burned out, abandoned,
strafed in territorial feuds, boarded up
or razed, salt sprinkled on the mounds left
behind, for sale signs riddled with bullet
holes, gang graffiti ornamented, relics
no one cares to recall or revisit.
All the former denizens, drug dealers,
and their whores moved on, occupying
new digs that soon resemble the old:
from Odell to Kelton, from Elberon to
Quail to Washington; forsaken places,
reclamation projects so far past due
only those with no future go there.

The 13th Step

“I was out for a typical quiet
Sunday in the bar: a couple of
cold ones, a few giggles with a
couple of the boys and a game on
the tube. That was until she walked
in. Not your typical Sunday regular
beginning with the nose ring
and ending with the spiky hair.
We’re just shooting casual breeze
when she says:’ It’s been awhile,
Let’s have shots and beers to celebrate.’
Drops this pile of bills on the bar
all wadded up like she’s been keeping
them in her spare combat boots.
‘What the hell?’ is always my byword
Next thing you know, we’re doing
these amazing to the brim shots
of chilled Jack Daniels at 3 on a Sunday
afternoon. A couple of those later
and we’re ready to blow for a more happening
scene. We’re in The Lark, I think, and
she’s trying to grab the mike from the Blues
guitarist, remember the guy who did
the MTV spot at Pauly’s? He’s cool but it’s
definitely not his scene to yield
the stage to a spiky head bimbo with
a nose ring who wants to sing Kansas City
way off key. He had the bouncers
on his side so even though I know
I’ll never do the Lark thing again, I decide
to split with or without her. Now she’s
really getting hysterical. Something about
her medicine wearing off. All of a sudden,
these details she’s been laying out all
afternoon are starting to come together.
Probation had been mentioned off-hand,
now became felonious assault with a vehicle
while under the influence and this Rehab
thing in the distant past, was about an hour
before she sat down at the bar with the wad.
Now, it’s All MY Fault her life is turning
to shit. I guess that’s what I get
trying to get lucky instead of going
to church. She even said, as a kind of
parting shot, that I was the next step
they warned her about when the 12 Steps
failed. Oh, well, compared to what could
have happened, it’s not really that big
of a deal to delist your phone number,
change your name and move, is it?”

Old Man

at the bus stop,
cadging cigarettes,

right side useless,
supported by a cane,

stroke afflicted,
mostly bald head

hidden beneath
old Yankees cap,

nearly transparent skin

He looks oddly familiar,
more familiar than he should,

until I remember why,
remember how he used to brag

say how I’d made him
his first legal drink

when he was five years
younger than I was

before he became half dead
and twice my age

Alan Catlin has been publishing since the 70’s which makes him older than dirt as far as online publishing goes. He has adapted and has published in dozens if not hundreds of online publications and even got nominated for a Best of the Net Award. That and dozens of Pushcart nominations, Stoker Award nominations, Rhysling Nominations and etc, and two bucks will get you on the local express bus.

Cajun Mutt Press Featured Writer 12/22/23

December 22, 2023 James D. Casey IV

Bender Found

lost dance, somewhere in the
bottom of a bottle yet unopened lies the
rhythm that was washed away by
the cruel torrent of reality. as I sustain the
bender for another day, another week, or year even, I’m
struggling to kindle the old fires of passion, of when the
page was ravished nightly by the mad dance on the
keyboard that saw too many of them ruined
and tossed into the common yard of the apartment complex. the insanity
of years-long benders, where sanity was maintained by puffs from
glass pipes and inhalations from burning spoons. nothing
happens, I just get drunk, pass out, kill the hangover with a
rum/vodka/orange concoction, and move to
coffee, trying to edit the lines of inebriation hoping to
find the gems amidst the steaming pile of shit. nothing’s
there, with insanity gone I have
nowhere to go except for down, to the
place modern writers sit, sip Starbucks caramel coffee and talk about
character progression, diversity, inclusivity, and stuff like
that. I once almost punched a classmate in a college class for
trying to overanalyze Hem’s stories. it’s all about rediscovering
the desire to walk near the edge, to drink haphazardly until
you can’t even tell on which side of the canyon you’re on.

Currently residing in Greece, George Gad Economou has a Master’s degree in Philosophy of Science and is the author of Letters to S. (Storylandia), Bourbon Bottles and Broken Beds (Adelaide Books), and Of the Riverside (Anxiety Press). His words have also appeared, amongst other places, in Spillwords Press, Ariel Chart, Cajun Mutt Press, Fixator Press, Outcast Press, The Piker Press, The Edge of Humanity Magazine, The Rye Whiskey Review, and Modern Drunkard Magazine.

Cajun Mutt Press Featured Writer 08/04/23

August 4, 2023 James D. Casey IV

Hungover Trilogy

weather report

Your eyes are narrowed,
Red-rimmed and bloodshot.
Your breath smells of yeast
and rotten meat
and you’re wearing the smile
that chilled Red Ridinghood
to the bone.
I’m backed into the corner
of my chair,
spine straight, frozen.
Hoping if I sit still enough,
I’ll become invisible
and your words won’t pounce,
but it’s too late.

It’s my fault for not reading
the Weather Report,
not noticing the size
of the amber waves
washing down your throat;
for forgetting the undertow
that follows
and now I’m caught in it
and drowning in the depths
of Shadows
I didn’t create.

come morning

I’m trying to make myself small.
Curl in on myself
until I exist only in theory.
Until your anger
can’t touch any part of me
that’s real.

I’m lost.
Like an animal in a corner,
I’m bristled and high-strung.
Alert. Weary.
I’m exhausted from living on the edge
but I don’t know how to back down.
How to save myself,
let alone anyone else.

But you’ll never see me cry
because I always remember
to leave the rose-colored glasses
on your nightstand.
And come morning,
I’ll be all smiles.

my hill

I’m tired of waking up
To brush the taste of rage
From my teeth and tongue.
How many times
Can I regret
All the words
Spoken and swallowed
Before I have to admit
The problem is me?

But I’m waging
Another private war.
Forcing everyone to walk
Over minefields
As they pass.
Turning the house
Into a battlefield
Filled with tight,
Forced smiles.

I drink too much
To dull the anger
And the rage.
I drink too much
To stop thinking
About plans of attack.
I drink too much
And wall myself in
With empty bottles-
The berm of a foxhole
Dug in the shape
Of my own grave.

My dad always told me
Some hills
Weren’t worth dying on.
I think he got it
From a movie,
But every morning
I stand before the General
In the mirror,
Brush my teeth
And wonder
If I’ve found that hill,
Or if tonight
Will be another chance
To find out.

Chris Dean is a poet and spoken word artist from the heart of Indiana, where they live with their husband. Recent works have appeared in The Whiskey Mule Diner and The Blue Motel Rooms.