Cigarette Week
zig zag
One of the biggest disappointments in my life recently has been discovering that cigarettes will not bend. When I was little I watched an awful lot of cartoons and characters who smoked were often fated to mishaps that would find them lying on the floor, leaning against a wall, or propped up in a door frame with a forlorn, bemused look on their face, smoking a stubby cigarette bent into a zig-zag pattern. It’s almost iconic in my head. But when I fall or run into something or am involved in a terrific coincidence of forces my cigarettes just break, leaving me with half a tube of bitter tobacco that tastes like cold smoke. Nothing tastes worse than a re-burn, so lighting what is left is simply out of the question. Even villains get to finish their smoke on television. I just get a wasted stick of carcinogen that I want nothing to do with.
“I should name it something like Pollution.”
The fresh cool morning air is still
as I walk past a girl sitting on a circular stone bench.
She’s smoking.
She pushes soft white smoke from between her lips
and it pauses to hang in the air above her head.
I look back and notice my own smoke
suspended in the air behind me.
I wonder if she notices how beautiful it all seems,
our smoke, making trails in the sky.
recessed filters
The worst thing about smoking, worse than the bad breath, or the wasted money, or even the cancer, is the fact that you really shouldn’t be doing it. I mean really, honestly and truly shouldn’t be doing that sort of thing to yourself.
It’s a bit like walking on nails for fun.
When I was four the doctors told my dad that if he didn’t quit smoking I would die. I just wouldn’t be able to breathe anymore, or something like that. Smoking was one of the few things he had in common with his dad and one of the few things he liked to do.
He quit cold turkey.
Now I smoke.
I’m always worried that dad will find out and be disappointed in me. He’ll walk up to me on the street and see me smoking and our friendship will be over. Sometimes I tell myself that if I get lung cancer I can blame it on him smoking when I was little.
Wouldn’t that make him feel like shit?
One of the biggest disappointments in my life recently has been discovering that cigarettes will not bend. When I was little I watched an awful lot of cartoons and characters who smoked were often fated to mishaps that would find them lying on the floor, leaning against a wall, or propped up in a door frame with a forlorn, bemused look on their face, smoking a stubby cigarette bent into a zig-zag pattern. It’s almost iconic in my head. But when I fall or run into something or am involved in a terrific coincidence of forces my cigarettes just break, leaving me with half a tube of bitter tobacco that tastes like cold smoke. Nothing tastes worse than a re-burn, so lighting what is left is simply out of the question. Even villains get to finish their smoke on television. I just get a wasted stick of carcinogen that I want nothing to do with.
“I should name it something like Pollution.”
The fresh cool morning air is still
as I walk past a girl sitting on a circular stone bench.
She’s smoking.
She pushes soft white smoke from between her lips
and it pauses to hang in the air above her head.
I look back and notice my own smoke
suspended in the air behind me.
I wonder if she notices how beautiful it all seems,
our smoke, making trails in the sky.
recessed filters
The worst thing about smoking, worse than the bad breath, or the wasted money, or even the cancer, is the fact that you really shouldn’t be doing it. I mean really, honestly and truly shouldn’t be doing that sort of thing to yourself.
It’s a bit like walking on nails for fun.
When I was four the doctors told my dad that if he didn’t quit smoking I would die. I just wouldn’t be able to breathe anymore, or something like that. Smoking was one of the few things he had in common with his dad and one of the few things he liked to do.
He quit cold turkey.
Now I smoke.
I’m always worried that dad will find out and be disappointed in me. He’ll walk up to me on the street and see me smoking and our friendship will be over. Sometimes I tell myself that if I get lung cancer I can blame it on him smoking when I was little.
Wouldn’t that make him feel like shit?