Today I smoked my
first
last
cigarette.
I tucked it between my lips
as a
mother does
each night.
I pulled the sweetest,
softest drag
and the smoke mingled with
my sadness and my
exhaustion and
my defeat.
Released in foggy grey,
these feelings floated
to the surface
like dust
blown off a tomb
That
first
last
cigarette ended
too soon.
So I lit another
and made myself a hazy halo
and crowned myself with disease
and in a destructive moment
I was empty and
I was pleased.
And I think this
first
last
cigarette,
pouring out of me in streams,
singed my pain,
made me *****,
and clean.

And I said
as I smoked
my
first
new
cigarette.
*I quit.