The Science of Falling Short
It starts as a hypothesis that maybe this time the glass will hold me together instead of breaking me down
I measure it carefully at first like a lab experiment one finger, then two watching the amber swirl like something almost holy
they say chemistry is predictable reaction follows reaction but no one accounts for the human variable how I always add too much of what undoes me
ethanol becomes language translating silence into something I can almost speak but every sentence slurs into unfinished thoughts and apologies I never quite complete
there's a formula somewhere for tolerance for the way the body learns to survive poison by asking for more of it
I am both subject and study charting the slow collapse how gravity seems stronger at night how the floor keeps proving I am not immune
they'd call it dependence in cleaner terms write it down in textbooks like it's something clinical manageable detached
but there is nothing sterile about waking up with regret calcified in your throat like a failed equation you keep trying to solve
I keep thinking if I get the measurements right less this time or maybe just enough I could find the balance
but every experiment ends the same overflow spillage a system breaking under its own design
and me somewhere between the control and the chaos proving, again that I don't know how to stop
only how to fall and call it study
only how to fall short and call it science
