Alcoholism: Cloud Briefly Visible For A Moment Above Zelda Fitzgerald’s Head

I think of total exhaustion and being. How it takes me from winter to summer. Then I think of you and the space, the gap you in-habit for me.

The thing is I don’t distrust you, or pain. I think of you unburdened.

I think of you but you’re light years away from me now. Once I called you home. Once you called me sanctuary. Your hands were like a hat full of leaves, a porcelain teacup full of blue sky. Now all I know is betrayal, ghost protocol, the estrangement of the heart, the page, the frozen sea. I am the surgeon. You are the vibes in my fingers at the operating table. You are the phases of a Saturday morning, the leveling out of daylight. There’s nothing common about you. About your system of arrows, your symphony of sorrows. You’re light, I’m a bird found with an olive branch in it’s mouth. The notes found here in this world’s paradise are tentative. I’m thinking of you again. Now what is so wrong about that. You were romance, and I was homelessness. Now all that I know of love is extinct for me.

Zelda is waiting for the light. We’re all waiting on the museum. She’s waiting for the light. I’m waiting for the light. The world is full of stories for us to sup on. Even you must have one. The text sparkles.

Stay ahead of the geopolitical week.

MD Briefing delivers expert analysis across five global fronts — the Indo-Pacific, energy, geoeconomics, European security, and the Middle East — every Monday morning. Free.

It stretches out into the widening silence. Zelda is fathoming. The old girl has hit her head. She is bleeding from the wound. Her heart over the years has been faithful. Zelda is young and smart and no-nonsense. The priest must come over the vastness of desert and city jungle. The priest must come to pray for me. Zelda is not holy like the tubers and fossils found underground are. I’m left to clutch at the bird in my hand.

Zelda is eating sunflower seeds and honey. The old girl pours milk into her tea. I’m falling in love with Tarzan. Me Jane. Let’s give thanks. Let’s celebrate the galaxies. New and old.

I fear photographs and the cold sea’s philosophy. Now we all grow like wildflowers. Anywhere that we please. Like the seed of a mustard tree.

There’s nothing as beautiful as the newspaper man eating fresh plums.

The woods, mushrooms, potatoes. The vibrations of foliage. Daylight.

Glory. A tender swarm. The triumph of an athlete. The redemption of a sinner. Spring found in the desert. A Saturday morning. Leaf! Oh, sacred leaf! Universal winter. Cat. The action of rope found in blood.

The shadow of a woman found in the venerable wild. There’s nothing as beautiful as deep-blue love. The echo of a bird. An icy wind that freezes everything green but the gap of time. A page in a book. Golden people. Fire. Bright places. Novel places. Iron faces. The out-lines of a lonely season and hills. There’s nothing as beautiful as the woman in the photograph. The bride of high summer days. The confession of a sinner. The perfumed juice of a pear. Bird. Field.

Abigail George
Abigail George
Abigail George is an award-winning short story writer, author, essayist, playwright, screenwriter and an award-winning poet. She is a Pushcart Prize, two-time Best of the Net nominated, Sol Plaatje European Union Poetry Prize longlisted, Writing Ukraine Prize shortlisted, Identity Theory's Editor's Choice, Ink Sweat Tears Pick of the Month poet/writer. In 2021, her writing was recognised by Afrocritik among the 20 Remarkable African Essays. In 2023, she was the winner of the Sol Plaatje European Union Poetry Award. In 2023, she was shortlisted for the Writing Ukraine Prize; in 2024, her poem, “Rebirth” received an Honourable Mention in the New Coin Poetry Prize, and in 2025, she was shortlisted for the Erbacce Prize. In 2025, she was longlisted for the Erbacce Prize and her poems were selected for the Erbacce Journal. She is a two-time recipient of grants from the National Arts Council in Johannesburg, one from the Centre of the Book in Cape Town and another from ECPACC in KuGompo City. She won a national high school writing competition in her teens. She was interviewed by BBC Radio 4, for AOL.com, the USA Today Network, The Tennessean, and Radio Ikrikya in Algeria. Her writing has appeared in Agbowo, Botsotso, Critical Muslim, Jalada, Kalahari Review, LitNet, Ons Klyntji, Piker Press, The Eastern Province Herald, The Ovi, and others. She was educated in Port Elizabeth and Swaziland. She is the Contributing Editor for African Writer Magazine based in New Jersey, and an editor at Mwanaka Media and Publishing situated in Zimbabwe. Her latest book is "Did You Get Married to Her When I was in the Mental Hospital". Find it on Amazon and at the ZamaShort shop. Find her on Bluesky, LinkedIn, Substack, and Instagram @abigailgeorgepoet.