a cigarette burned away
ashes fell, flicked aside.
tar burned words in
lungs, nicotine
holding them back,
gasping for breath.

a cigarette burned away
in the dark, lying beside
me, chest rising, falling.
trails of burnt emotions
curled around us, lifting
higher, higher.

a cigarette burned away,
smelling sweeter than it should,
wrapping, enthralling itself
in every space, corner, molecule, atom,
warming those dry, brittle lips
against the winter wind.
caught between the clouds,
in confusion,
a cigarette burned away