My best advice from Tom Waits

by Michael Galko

Is not to blame it on the piano,
or use it, in the sweetspot,
to pick up lonely bar girls.

No. His best advice, heard
in a radio interview,
was about how to quit it,

the romantic gin & tonic.
First, he rasped, you need
to occupy your hands.

A drinker’s hands are never empty.
So hold something, anything,
tightly. For two years I

clutched a bottomless
bottle of diet coke,
fingered some string,

a rubik’s cube, a paper clip,
a rubber ball, a thin little pen
to click. Another two years

with sparkling water and ice,
bubbling. Now I just sit
with dancing hands, as if

conjuring an object, and listen
to this hoarse bellow coming
on up to the house, crowing.