Each April since 1987, the National Council on Alcohol and Drug Dependence, Inc. has sponsored Alcohol Awareness Month to \u201cincrease public awareness and understanding, reduce stigma and encourage local communities to focus on alcoholism and alcohol-related issues.\u201d<\/p>\n
William Oldys, born in 1696 and died April 15, 1761, was an English poet, bibliographer, and antiquarian known to be fastidious in his lifelong task of recording historical data. Biographies of his time state he drank large amounts of alcohol. My surmise is the cup he talks about in the poem contained alcohol. I have appropriated a great deal of his rhyme scheme and the sonnet form he used in my sonnet. These two poems form a call and response from the 18th\u00a0to the 21st\u00a0century. They were published together in the Saipan Tribune several years ago. They pay homage to both National Poetry Month and Alcohol Awareness Month.<\/p>\n
William Oldys: On a Fly Drinking Out of His Cup<\/strong><\/p>\n Busy, curious, thirsty fly! Both alike are mine and thine J. Connolly: On a Guy Drinking Out of His Mind<\/strong><\/p>\n Boozing, serious, thirsty barfly! Cheap shots of whisky, beer and wine *** Each April since 1987, the National Council on Alcohol and Drug Dependence, Inc. has sponsored…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":387597,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[26,23672,23673],"class_list":["post-389466","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinion","tag-cnmi","tag-lvnv","tag-nola"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=389466"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389466\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/387597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=389466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=389466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=389466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nDrink with me and drink as I:
\nFreely welcome to my cup,
\nCouldst thou sip and sup it up:
\nMake the most of life you may,
\nLife is short and wears away.<\/p>\n
\nHastening quick to their decline:
\nThine\u2019s a summer, mine\u2019s no more,
\nThough repeated to threescore.
\nThreescore summers, when they\u2019re gone,
\nWill appear as short as one!<\/p>\n
\nDrunk like me; here’s mud in your eye:
\nSpilling shots from a paper cup,
\nCans and bottles just\u00a0sucking em up.
\nDrinking throughout the rest of the day,
\nYour life getting shorter – wasting away.<\/p>\n
\nHasten us both to a quick decline:
\nFirst we sing, then we’re a bore,
\nRound after round, calling out for more.
\nYour ‘happy hour’ has come and gone,
\nPassing out on your way back to the john.<\/p>\n
\nJoey aka Pepe Batbon Connolly is a retired educator who taught in the CNMI, NOLA, and LVNV. He is a sonnet practitioner who enjoys stargazing.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"