Addictive Personalities Are Genetic.


There is never a plausible excuse to skin the knees of those you love,
by taking their training wheels off too soon as they collapse into thorny bushes,
nor allow them to burn from their once fiery child-like wonder
to picking up a cigarette,
old habits don’t die hard,
that’s why second, third, and fourth generation smokers still exist
Home is not where the heart is,
Home is the name given to places that keeps you warm without being burned;
making you feel whole again,
after years of being hollow

Do not mistake people as a shelter-
find comfort in your own soul
and these hands that open life's doors

You don’t have to be shadowed by your supposed love ones, 
you do not have to lose your voice,
or grasp upon the rotting wooden front porch door, 
leaving splinters in your fingertips

Your lungs, like deflated balloons 
exasperated to walk into the war, 
the foundation you dwell in

Clawing your way from the disapproval of cruel words, 
you don’t have to lose your heart in that messy place

Someone who claims to believe in you,

shreds you: to sculpt something better
is not worthy of being marveled-

There are some things even the devil knows he was never fit for, 
and some companions are demons in disguise

Let the tar scald those lungs,
forget the reasons you no longer wish to breathe
even after you die anguish rests in my marrow
--
and the guilt just sits between my teeth
 as she uses the flames from the hell she is in
to became a fifth generation smoker

i’ll keep his brand,
just because it’s cheaper,
but i’m going back to reds.
i used to hate menthols
and i grew to like them
as i grew to like him;
the mint coated my mouth
and made it feel as though
the smoke was his breath
at the times he wasn’t with me.
i don’t want to remember him
every time i light a cigarette.

i need to find new music
because all I’ve been listening to
has been reminding me of him.
i’ve been crying when
i can hear him singing along.
i even carved hearts into my skin
when crying stopped being cathartic.

i’m tired of everything i do
being connected to him,
so i’m going back to reds.

Another another another another,
A fire at one end a fool at the other,
My soul is starving but I feed it hot air,
I'm dying inside but don't seem to care.

Put down your back seat and make a bed
It is 8:04am
You turned your knees into ash trays
I keep asking how you ended up an addict... all you say is smoke follows beauty
You point out the birthmarks on my arm and say an angels kissed me. But I'm not blessed. I guess, I don't know...

your desire since you were a child was to be a singer,
The world gave you cigarettes.
You also wanted to be an astronaut,
The world gave you gravity,

Eventually you grew content enough to lay down on the grass, smoke your mind away, and stare at the stars.

All these sad sillouhettes of sad people, artists and creatives.
Smoke filtering through broken lungs.
Rising and lifting the spirits of the dead.

Coz we are the broken few who see the light in the darkest of moments, breathing in the dampest air, and enjoying every moment.