Drunken Poetry

I have been drunk just twice in my life, 

and the second time was that afternoon;

so everything that happened has a dim, hazy cast over it, 

although until after eight o’clock the 

apartment was full of cheerful sun. 

Sitting on Tom’s lap Mrs. 

Wilson called up several people on the telephone; 

then there were no cigarettes, 

and I went out to buy some at the drugstore on the corner. 

When I came back they had disappeared, 

so I sat down discreetly in the living-room 

and read a chapter of Simon Called Peter — 

either it was terrible stuff or the whiskey distorted things, because it didn’t make any sense to me. (Fitzgerald 33-34)