i always fumble with my lighter;
holding it in the wrong hand, i
have trouble making sparks lunge to gas dance to flame.
and i hate heat on my fingerpads,
offending my lukewarm sensibilities.
i still cough at least
once every other cigarette, and
it sounds just like when i choke on your name.
i want to forget the people i've loved
so violently that my blood is no longer mine,
transfused from one-in-the-morning typewriter poets
and fainting red flowers in kitchen-table vases.
while boys kiss her thighs
and run the clumsy infatuated fingers of
three-in-the-afternoon text message poets
down the arching white flesh along her spine,
i smoke to forget the people i've loved like war crimes.
i only forget outside,
so the scent won't cling to me like
bad thoughts do.
i only grow gardens in ill-suited places,
where i know nothing but weeds will thrive--
so walk with me beneath the arbors of gulping english ivy,
lay with me in beds of canada thistle.
light me up
with a match or your tongue
or whatever else you've got to make me feel human.
