Remember to Slow Down

you asked  me carefully and without offense why I smoked

after which I opened my new pack hands trembling vainly getting the plastic  off the  Goddamn thing

I look you in the eye as I hold my filter cigarette in between my right middlefinger and pointy finger

pointing my cigarette up towards god perhaps

and try not to smile too uncontrollably. I repeat your question:

‘‘Why I smoke?’‘

‘‘Because,’‘ I take a hit, sigh with relief, continue my speech:

‘‘I am in love with nicotine, the same way you’re in love with sex or whatever.’’

I take another drag ‘‘And in a way it is a means to visualize the depression going on within me. I mean, if you tell someone you feel like crap, it’s like you just opened the whose the worst off contest. And when you try to tell them how bad it really is they don’t hear you. But this…”

I take another drag inhaling the tabacco  deeply ‘‘this, they believe; it is like a metaphor that resembles how fucked up you are, you know?’’

‘‘I guess, another reason I smoke is to forget about stuff- like all of it, all the stuff.

It’s effective distraction in a way other things can’t.’’

I take a final few puffs and turn my head slightly as I try to figure out why you are trying to figure out my habits