Understanding One

One drink
can quickly drag a man
down those 12 steps
it took so long
to crawl up

But one despicable love
can infect a man
with a furious sadness
so powerful
so consuming
he becomes alive
with a profound
incurable nothing

One job
can torture
and demolish a man
rendering him primal
like the shit eating grin
of a supervised war

And one reason
once discovered
is all we need
to explain
the mess we’ve made
of our lives

Because one chance is all
we are afforded
trusting nothing
was wasted
making god a clown