Her puffed pink lips wrapped
around the **** of her freshly lit cigarette,
hollowing her cheeks and sinking her eyes
as if death breathed her in and exhaled her out
as the smoke billowed out her nose
like an early 1950’s ad for Camel.
Her blue eyes were never opened all they way,
the black lashes heavy from the piling layers of mascara
she never washed off and under-eyes caked
with a yellow-orange tint that sat deep
into her sinking wrinkles, but the way her painted lips
kissed that cigarette made my heart yearn for a faster beat.
In and out, death bathed in her every breath until
nothing but the brown paper, stamped with her lipstick,
remained. Her ******* opened,
the cigarette still coughing up smoke as the toe
of her battered converse pressed it against the earth.
She waits a moment, looking out into
the busy streets of the city, until the itching of her fingers
is too much and she leans into her bag to pull out another one.
Through her heavy lashes, peaking over the basin under her eyes,
between the strands of her golden bangs
shown two bloodshot ponds that swallowed me whole.
The voice that snaked from her lips enticed me,
it sounded shattered and homely, rough and soothing,
as she leaned in and whispered
“Got a light?"