"Sitting in the dark with a drink in his hand, killing himself slowly."

Rubenstein playing Rachmaninoff's 2nd.
A glass of Scotch on the rocks.
I'm alone in the night wishing for you.

I've come to rely on the Waters of Lethe.
My simple substitute for intimacy.
A secret place where I can hide.
The next best thing to suicide.

"Give me the Waters of Lethe
that numb the heart, if they exist.
I will still not have the power
to forget you."
Ovid


The heart asks pleasure first,
And then, excuse from pain;
And then, those little anodynes
That deaden suffering,

And then, to go to sleep;
And then, if it should be
The will of its Inquisitor,
The liberty to die.

Emily Dickinson