Free Verse Poem
I like cigarettes.
I like the tingle in my lungs when I inhale,
a quick spark that makes me feel alive, less numb,
a little further from reality.
I love the murmur of the town below-
car horns blaring, bringing life to the darkness,
the lights bleeding into the sky,
the ash singeing my fingertips
as if reminding me I’m still here.
Sometimes I don’t even smoke.
I let the tobacco burn down on its own,
a slow suicide I never commit,
just breathing in the haze,
watching it curl around me like ghosts in the air.
It’s not about the nicotine-
no, never about the nicotine,
not about the rush.
It’s about the ritual,
the pausing between heartbeats,
the quiet war between wanting to feel
and wanting to just disappear.
Up here,
above the clatter and neon,
I can almost believe
the smoke and the sky are the same-
that if I breathe deep enough,
I could vanish into it:
weightless, warm, untouchable.
And when the ember kisses my skin,
it stings, but it’s honest.
It hurts,
but it always tells the truth.
And so, I light another.
The Altar 