Sometimes I Smoke Cigarettes

Sometimes I smoke cigarettes
I hold one between my lips
Loving it’s lightness.
I inhale big and hold my breath.
I get a little dizzy as the smoke
Buzzes through my insides.
I kiss the smoke goodbye as it
Leaves my lips,
Changing shape.

Sometimes I smoke cigarettes.
I do.
I smoke cigarettes
With a cappuccino
Warm in my hand
As Joni Mitchell
Cries out to me
From the record
spinning round and round.
I sit listening
so still.

About 352 days a year
I recognize smoke as poison.
I hold my breath when
Passing a smoker on the street.
About 352 days a year
I know what’s good for me.

But sometimes I smoke cigarettes.
I smoke and read old love letters.
I skim the pages of journals,
Pages of dreams past.
It’s then the sweet smoke
Travels into me,
Cradling my heart.
Sometimes I smoke cigarettes and weep.

About 352 days a year
I know which way is up
And I move in that direction.
About 352 days a year I say yes
And smile
And laugh from my guts.
About 352 days a year
I know it gonna be alright.

But sometimes,
Yes, sometimes,
I smoke cigarettes.

your BODY
is a LOVE LETTER
to GOD.

I'll Be Lighter Then

Looking at your tea
Still warm
I feel both it’s
Relief and emptiness
In being half drunk
Half consumed.

There are leftovers inside of me
That need to be
wrapped up
And refrigerated
But they sit out on the counter
Hoping someone sees them
Before they go bad.
They try to look delicious
But inside they know
Times a tickin’.

As I watch you walk down the stairs,
I see flashes of the film we created
The film that created us-
I used to know how it ended-
I used to be the writer.
What I didn’t realize was
Our hearts were the directors
And God is the producer
And the end
is locked in a vault in the sky.

I see glimpses of the years of footage to come.
You holding hands with your kids.
You walking down the aisle.
You losing your hair but never your bad jokes.
Thousands of cups of coffee
Miles of records
Tons of laughs
Bottles and bottles of wine.

But someone
A beautiful someone
Has been cast in the role
I always thought was mine.
The role I held like a blanket
Over my wild heart.

I thought it would keep me warm
But I couldn’t breathe.

My heart so full of fire
Began burning up the blanket
Til it lay in ashes around my feet.

As I lay here watching my pen dance
Across these pages,
I know this is where I should be
And you are on your own road now.

All that’s left are memories-
Just thoughts.

I’ll take a hot shower and watch them
Wash down the drain.
They’ll wave on their way
Down
Down
Down.
I’ll be lighter then.

Anais Nin

"And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom."

Null and Void

Your kisses have lost their meaning.
They are null and void.
Every press of your lips against my skin
Feels like poison.
Every soft word
Drowns out the sound
Of the snake waiting around the corner.
There is nothing harder to hear
Than your praise
Which sweeps over me
And onto the next pretty face.
There is nothing harder to swallow
Than your lies
Which you mix with truth
Like tossed salad.
There is nothing harder handle
Than the loss of you
And my happy delusion.

I wonder if I dreamt you.

Pieces of thoughts
And fragments of affection.
All that is left
Are memories
Wrapped up in smoke.

To find your voice is the work.
To be heard is the skill.
And to inspire is the ART.