Update:

Turns out she didn't like it. And that's fine.
I write for myself.
Though on occasion it would be nice to receive with excitement reflective of the deliverer.

Amen.

Beyond the stars, deep within blackness, refracted particles of past times being. Moment for moment, alone with the notion, I'd trade each piece of me in for some portion of wisdom as I **** myself slowly in smoke on the stoop where I sit just after midnight, every night perpetuating dreams. Fantasies where it all ends in static, dramatically falling away from the world with memories intact. Stuck within limbo, clawing for purpose between the endless sleep. Deep within blackness, the faces I sat with for years come streaming in, and mask for mask, in the stars' masquerade, you're in your place trapped in love as the others. I deport data as I rend through the sky, I know that I'll find you, as the dirt parts from the coffin lid and I explode into light.

If you are a wildfire,
then I am the hollow trees.
Surround and swallow me,
consume and crush me.

Burn me from the inside out.

Your lips tasted like cigarettes,
bitter sweet.
Your smoke flooded my lungs,
so I inhaled and held you in

even though it burned.

[A dialogue between Brigid and her boss, Hollis. Hollis has called Brigid into his office and gestured to close the door.]

Brigid: Hey, sorry. You know how hard it is getting him outta here when he's got a problem.

Hollis: I do, I do. Go ahead and pop a squat for a second, dear.

Brigid: So what's going on?

Hollis: Brigid, your fingers are always so ashy.

[Brigid wipes her hands on the darkest part of her faded slacks.]

Brigid: Oh, yeah, that's a bad habit that's getting worse. I was just in the bathroom, too. So I guess I should probably start washing my hands more often.

Hollis: No, hon, it's not about the ashes -- you're smoking **** in the office. More and more it seems like.

Brigid: Oh I mean, I've been smoking for a while.

Hollis: Not in the office.

Brigid: Well, now I do.

Hollis: You don't see anything wrong with that?

Brigid: I mean, you never really said anything about it when I brought it in the first time, so I just kinda kept on going. And that, that was like, at least two weeks ago, I think.

Hollis: I don't think it's been as long as you're thinking.

Brigid: I see what you're trying to do here. However long doesn't matter -- I know for a fact you've seen me before and didn't say anything.

Hollis: I'm saying something now.

Brigid: Yes you are.

Brigid: Oh.

Hollis: Look, hon. Could you just go use the balcony round back?

Brigid: Well sure, but I kinda have to be at the desk, you know? That's why I never leave on my breaks, either.

Hollis: Brigid, it looks bad.

Brigid: What, smoking ****?

Hollis: Yes, it looks real bad. It reflects the professionalism of the Human Services Office. Or the lackthereof.

Brigid: How?

Hollis: I believe it's popular opinion that being under the influence of any substance impairs your ability to dutifully perform your work, and perform work that sets the best possible standard.

Brigid: Actually, and I kid you not, it really, really helps me perform my work. See, without it, I believe, I would not be able to live up to your standards.

Hollis: You're acting like--

Brigid: Hollis, please, for the love of god. I'm such an awesome employee, right? Always upright. Always for the good of the people. Last night! Last night I went to Davis's place for some coffee.

Hollis: I thought you were going to stop doing that.

Brigid: You should have seen it. Oh god, the mess that went down. Unruly mercenary helping hands serving fists up to unappreciative patrons, *** workers slinging emselves over tables and the bar, sweat and all that other nasty body water mixing up next to all the food and alcohol.

Hollis: What--

Brigid: Hollis, I went out back for a cigarette and there were people milling around in the alley ******* each other. People are ******* ******* behind Davis's place, and you're worried about just, a little bit of the good stuff defacing the image our city.

Hollis: Jesus Christ, okay, alright. You're right, that's disgusting.

Brigid: Told ya.

Hollis: When you gotta smoke, just ask Helen to watch the front for you.

Brigid: What if I just put the pipe away when someone's at the counter?

Hollis: I'd really prefer outside.

Brigid: Okay, how about, if I go to the window. So that way there's no smoke inside?

Hollis: You're just about ******* impossible, little girl. Forget I said anything, forget the whole ****** thing. I ask you for one favor, and you can't even do that.

Brigid: I do all your other favors.

[Brigid gets up and walks to the door.]

Hollis: You're still giving me that discount on Cheese, right?

Brigid: Absolutely. I'm gonna take a break and go out back for a cigarette.

I like to imagine my neighbors having ***.
Familiar faint squeaks catch my interest while ****
cooks red with my lips at the tip of the **** pipe.
First faint then foot to floor driving the grand prix
while exhaling and pale I stare up at the ceiling.
They're *******. That smooth and dark brown,
long black and kinked hair having, bare hairy
belly in leather jacket wearing strange and
tasty cut of chubbed up muscle overpowering
with his plowing, the the soft plump curves
of her in alabaster white, coif cut long but
both the sides, inside her just so open walls,
pounding deeply in snycopated beating
rhythms, in love or lust, it's left to be wondered.
My favorite balancing act, knee wobbling
daring to throw me from the one legged stance
where I perch with my ear in a glass, glass to asbestos,
living vicariously through them as if it's my sole chance to live,
Claire's mystical 1/8's  blare in the stale air from
the lone speaker on my TV and my breathing flickers.
Huffs to gasping puffs to sighs leading to huffs again,
I can't help that I spend time inside my head. I want it.
I dream of my neighbors *******.
Open. Bent down. *** up. Deleting the question marked
space between faces I make outside and in heat, alone under sheets in a bedroom.
I want to be ******.
**** me. Pound me.
Press me down and wrap your hand around my ribs.
Touching. Taking.