the smoker

[moonbird]

a sour-smelling roll
pressed between her cracked lips
smoldering black
she breathes in its dirty air
tastes it
blows it back out
like a fire-breather

her face is gone
oh
her pretty face
now there is only sunken gray eyes
lost in ashy pale skin
it’s wrinkled
like an old lady’s
though she’s still young

she sees me
smiles
oh, her yellow teeth
they frighten me
“this one’s the last”
she says
“no more after this”

she coughs
it sounds like it hurts her
she grinds out the last ember
stumbles to her feet
wanders away
into the night

she pauses under a street light
a soft click
a tiny flame

smoke trails behind her

[dizzydoll]

How eloquently you describe this disgusting habit, and how difficult it is to kick. :incazzato:
Also its a tight expression, that should please Huck. Good job. :biggrin5:

[D. J. R. Caron]

This has some provocative images done in very economical language, almost has a gritty, understated quality to it. The sentiment is nothing special (I mean, we all know smoking is bad for you), but you render it so cleanly and effectively, like a surgeon's scalpel, that it works anyway. Nice one.

[JackieGinger]

Is this meant to be propaganda?
Indeed, it is an excellent poem, extremely effective...but as a smoker I am tired of people trying to save me, "good-willed" people that try to convert me to THEIR beliefs.
This poem seems to be the glorious presentation of a smoker by a non-smoker.
Cigarettes do have beneficent effects too!

[hillwalker]

I would suggest that this is how most non-smokers see smokers - no propaganda, no patronising or judgement issues, just the hard facts that us non-smokers can't for the life of us see the appeal.....

[tailor STATELY]

Forgive me my bias.

1-Grandmother died of lung cancer when I was 3.
1-Grandmother died of heart disease due to smoking.
Mother copes with COPD due to emphesema.
Father-in-law has an "artificial larynx" or "electrolarynx" with which to speak with.
I cope with asthma undoubtedly due to exposure to secondhand smoke while growing up in an environment of smokers.

"Cigarettes do have beneficent effects too!"

Forgive me for tossing down your quote, stomping, and grinding it into the mire -
To put it poetically: Like calming the mind in anticipation of death before its time ? (not just visions of one on the wrong end of a murder of rifles at a firing squad party)

Forgive me my rant. I can't, I shan't be silent.
Evocative piece indeed.
Forgive me.
Forgive me.
Forgive me.

[PrinceMyshkin]

The thing is, you capture the repugnat effects of her addiction so well, that for a moment when she proclaims that that was her last one, one hopes - skeptically - for the best, but the epilogue is somehow inevitable and rendered non-judgmentally.

[MorpheusSandman]

I would echo all of the positive comments though I do think this feels a bit like propaganda; not much different than those TRUTH commercials. Though I wholly concur with the sentiment. I grew up with a mother that smokes and still smokes, and I couldn't stand it then and still can't stand it. I generally refuse to be around people who do it.

[Buh4Bee]

Is this meant to be propaganda?
Indeed, it is an excellent poem, extremely effective...but as a smoker I am tired of people trying to save me, "good-willed" people that try to convert me to THEIR beliefs.
This poem seems to be the glorious presentation of a smoker by a non-smoker.
Cigarettes do have beneficent effects too!

I hear you, but I didn't read the poem as propaganda. Smoking is bad.

[Buh4Bee]

Moonbird, I always like this style of poetry. It poetically tells a story that is vivid with a relevant point.

[JackieGinger]

The style of this poem is so eloquent that it actually made me think about smoking, which really annoyed me...smoking is bad - but it is needless to repeat it all the time.
Will you quit doing sth you like just because it is bad??
Quit loving - it is bad for your heart...:rolleyes: