when i was a girl
my mum smoked cigarettes
in her leopard print dressing gown
and boot slippers
she would come in from the patio, or the kitchen, or the garden
and up the stairs to tuck me into bed
stroke her hand across my head
chestnut curls from out of my face
the smell of the nicotine on her fingers
lingered in the air
attaching itself to the memory,
to the place
now i am a woman
and i smoke cigarettes
in my leopard print dressing gown
and my boot slippers
and when i come in from the patio, or the kitchen, or the garden
and up the stairs to tuck myself into bed
i stroke my hand across my head
maroon curls from out of my face
and as the smell of the nicotine lingers in the air
i remember when i was a girl
when my mum still smoked cigarettes
and wore her leopard print dressing gown
still wore her boot slippers
still tucked me into bed
Something wonderful happened two years ago.
On January 1, 2024, I gave up all forms of tobacco.
I've been smoke-free two years today.
I decided to throw my cigarettes away.
I also haven't used chewing tobacco or snuff.
I decided to abandon tobacco, I'd had enough.
I've been smoke-free for two years and I'm glad.
Cigarettes cause lung cancer and that's very sad.
Two years ago today, I said goodbye to tobacco.
If somebody offers you a cigarette, please say No.
Bad balloon
Harassing the enchanting moon
Covering song performed by wham
While playing lead singer in the legendary contra band
Dropping buds
Not knowing what?
Is going on
Fooling around, dropping potential cancerous bombs
Smoking I mean
Luring teens
Turning them ugly, abusive and mean
Disrupting travel
Unleash verdict’s parachute gavel
Sentencing the trip, ‘unravel’
Due to going pop
Taking a sniper shot
Sending the cargo towards the ground
Hopefully, found
Going down
Identified not the telescope, Hubble
Now in major, government trouble
It’s fantasy bubble
Has no one to cuddle
Realizing action was a must
Peaceful bust
Sending bad balloon to an eternal rest
Deeming it the best
Allowing the mess
To confess
And surrender, accepting arrest
Cigarette Smokers
In a world tainted by pollution and smog you're adding to the problem
Please don't think for a second that electric cigarettes will solve them
Cigarettes wouldn't be half bad if they just took the smoker out
It isn't fair that it kills those who wouldn't put one to their mouth
Parents smoke but would brake out in a rage if their children tried
What if each pack kept up with the growing number who died
Each smoker fails to realize what they smell and look like
The x-rays of their lungs to the doctors must be a horrible sight
They should ask themselves if this nasty habit is worth dying over
Are they recognizing with each puff their calling death much closer
What ingredients makes up the tobacco anyway
I heard rat poison makes up some of it so is that ok
Who's worse, neighborhood drug dealers or the tobacco company
They both make money from the lives they take if you're asking me
Some days, I’m still fighting the urge to light a cigarette—missing those rippling ribbons of smoke and the way they would uncoil in the dark, humid air. I’ve been coughing so much lately, and my lungs will hardly expand for any air that isn’t polluted at the source. I’ve been hacking up my lungs, and each time it feels like trying to drag them out through my throat just to see how charred they’ve become. I ignore any signs of disease—any signs of my own actions catching up to me—all because I’m so afflicted and so addicted to slowly ending my own life. Undoing the veiny strings of my body for no reason other than my love for being unhappy, only allowing myself to breathe the poison I think I deserve. After long nights, when my daydream canopies crumble, I always wish to commit blasphemy for you again—treat your white ash like the god I sometimes think stopped loving me long ago. I wish I could still believe the burning in my chest when I run is the only thing that will save me from a future that’s not home—because it saves me from a world where I feel like all I am is my flesh and bones.
Massaging me with body oil,
I am now your woman to spoil.
My hair’s become ringlets.
With an arch in the jacuzzi,
I lay back let you taste me.
String pearls and cigarettes.
There is an absence of my voice,
save an inarticulate noise.
The sound of a branding.
Your adept hands apply pressure,
hit that line of pain and pleasure.
My heart’s understanding.
Where do you end and I begin?
My safe word is ‘Separation’.
Manicured nails cut glass.
Mirrors left completely shattered,
lips left soiled and tattered.
Pure lux in sassafras.
Dropped the receiver, when Jill tried to phone
my old retriever, won’t pick up his bone
no more beer or cigarettes
I’m still here, with my regrets
she’s in Geneva, with that guy, Jerome.
Cleverness in chaos.
Twisted mischief threads
beneath razor intellect.
Urban antiquity,
out of place,
sherry to eyelash to eye.
Her cigarettes go better
with beer wisdom and
starry sky humidity.
Grand Dame, ferocious girl.
Lead me up a garden path that
stings until 5am on barren streets.
Vampiric. Languid.
There is no elegant sufficiency,
no want contained.
Faded lilies.
Threadbare wisdom swings
to giggling gallows below, aloft.
One more drink?
Reckless friend, take my hand
and drag me sweetly away.
These walls that lie before me are all I have left of my past
The scars bring back the memories I wish I didn't have
Enclose me in your boiling rain in which I can't escape
Cut myself with my lies and all of my mistakes
This place feels like Eden to the world outside
No love, no pain or sorrow, just a place where I can hide
I regret ignoring all of your advice
Now I wish I listened because it could've saved my life
But if I could turn back time and do it all again
I'd do everything the same, I love the mess I'm in
I am that slender lady in sexy white sheets,
my figure is smoking hot when my body touches the heat.
I’ll give you moments of pleasure and a fill of nicotine,
but around your healthy lungs I’ll weave my tricotine
I am a silent killer
causing deadly disease,
but people ignore the warnings and signs of expertise.
I am the international
loved by all my fans,
I’ll send them to the graveyard in polished caravans.
I am those smokey rollies the filthy cigarette,
you’ll find me on every shelve I am not that hard to get.
I’m craving a smoke
I’m craving a drag, a poisonous and toxic puff of smog
to fill my empty lungs to
pass the time to
feel the burn in my throat. I fill my body with
solitude
and meditate in cramped spaces with no air.
Lightheadedness
I hope one day you find what you are looking for but I still won’t
count my blessings. Despair is
an art
and I
try too hard sometimes to ignore pain.
And other times to fill my lungs with
a kind of tragic beauty
that kills.
I know you too feel the endless bitter burn of existence, I know your
melancholy
Oh too well. I’m in love with my suffering now, are you?
The way it
scratches too soft, too hard, tickles and then subsides. The way it
travels through your veins and insides, fills you with
all sorts of burns and bruises but
I’m just craving a smoke right now.
There will simply never ever be enough cigarettes
To erase all of my biggest losses and old regrets.
No matter how many I smoke, not enough to erase my frets.
I once had a lover who was a smoker
I told him I really wish he’d quit
The smell alone was quite a choker
And his clothes were full of it
I knew he was addicted and afflicted
So I tried to inspire change
Gave him a sucker hoping he’d lick it
Maybe retrain his smoker brain
When that didn’t work I continued to search
For he was my sun on cloudy day
His feelings I didn’t want to hurt
But kissing is like licking ashtray
So let’s try acupuncture this time
With a little luck and love you can
Beat this habit that should be a crime
To market or sale to woman or man
This really helped and he does well
His cravings are less with a stick
He turns to me all smoke free saying
What about your addiction to chocolate
When everyone wore Calvin Klein
I wore pairs of Old Navy jeans and graphic tees
When everyone carried a mouthful Menthol Cigarettes
I carried a mouthful of Sour Patch Kids
When everyone was having cups of Kalik
I was having cups of Pina Coladas
When everyone was rocking Air Jordans
I was rocking flip flops and Converse
When everyone went to Atlantis and Baha Mar
I went to Blue Lagoon and Ardastra Gardens
When everyone wanted to go to Miami
I wanted to go to Key West, Maui or Bora Bora
When everyone grew up to be a police
a teacher or a front desk clerk
I grew up to be a tour guide,
a beach nomad and a storyteller
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